Britain cut off: What other countries are saying as UK struggles with Covid and Brexit crises

European neighbours look on in horror as Britain concludes ‘a catastrophic year’, writes Rory Mulholland

World’s apart: the coronavirus ‘has yet again exacerbated’ Brexit, wrote one German newspaper (AFP via Getty Images)

If ever there was a time for European media to trot out that old, and fake, headline about “fog in the Channel – continent cut off” it was now, after a new coronavirus variant supercharged the looming Brexit chaos. 

But the continent’s newspapers and commentators simply played it straight, letting the awful facts speak for themselves. 

“In the United Kingdom, a coronavirus mutation concludes a catastrophic year,” said the grim headline in France’s Le Monde, which wondered if France should now ramp up its own restrictions to keep the new variant at bay.