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PROCEDURE FOR EU WITHDRAWL No EU Charter s or laws mention EU withdrawl, though under the United Nations Charter , all EU member states have agreed that: 'In the event of a conflict between the obligation between Members of the United Nations under the present Charter and their obligations under any other international agreement, their obligations under the present Charter shall prevail' (Article 103). This would mean that the EU cannot prevent a member from leaving, if the state could prove that its membership of the EU conflicts with part of the UN Charter; similarly states are only bound to follow EU law 'so far as they are compatible with existing international arrangements' (Article 37.5, Treaty Of Rome ). If a state were to wish to leave, it would be up to the European Court Of Justice to interpret current treaties as to the member's obligations and conditions of withdrawl Article on EU withdrawl . Under the theory of State Of Exception , it is possible that a national government could suspended all laws in its country, effectively withdrawing from the EU. The French Constitution , for example, contains clauses that allow for its entire suspension; this could suspend the EU laws in a country too. However, this would have to be justified in an extremely exceptional circumstance Agamben, Giorgio; Attel, Kevin (trans); 2005; State of Exception; University of Chicago Press . Greenland Greenland is the only territory to have chosen to leave the EU or its predecessors without also , a special treaty signed in 1984 to allow its withdrawl European law mentioning Greenland Treaty . By precedent, then, if a country wanted to withdraw from the EU it probably could, but special treaties and conditions would needed to be agreed on. This is because of pre-exiting commitments that any member state would have towards the EU and its fellow members. NATIONS LIKELY TO WITHDRAW The northern European states of Denmark , Sweden and the United Kingdom are seen as the most Eurosceptic . Unlike some smaller or poorer states, they rely less on subsidies from the EU and have fewer cultural/economic ties with other EU states. However, it is highly unlikely that any of them would withdraw. UKIP , a fringe party in the United Kingdom who promote EU withdrawl, have never been able to find majority support for a withdrawl referendum UKIP's 48% survey, their highest figure for a withdrawl referendum . In Sweden, calls for withdrawl have come from a few individuals, rather than any groups Swedish minister calls for EU withdrawl . TERRITORIES THAT HAVE LEFT EU MEMBER STATES Some former territories of European Union members have left the EU when they seceded from their ruling country. These territories - East Timor , Hong Kong and Macau - were not classed as part of the EU and EC Law s were not in force in these countries. Thus, their secession was not a big deal for the union and not withdrawl from it. REFERENCES |
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