British PM May fights for survival

British Prime Minister Theresa May was fighting for survival on Saturday after a failed election gamble undermined her authority and plunged the country into a major political crisis, days before the start of talks to leave the European Union. May’s bet that she could strengthen her hand by crushing what she believed to be a weak opposition Labour Party backfired spectacularly on Thursday as voters stripped her Conservative Party of a parliamentary majority. The stunning outcome leaves May battling to unite different factions in her party and reliant on a handful of Northern Irish parliamentarians just nine days before Britain starts the tortuous process of negotiating its departure from the EU. The outcome risks upsetting the political balance in Northern Ireland by aligning London more closely with the pro-British side in the divided province, and increases the chance that Britain will fall out of the EU in 2019 without a deal.National emergencyGerman Chancellor Angela Merkel said she assumed Britain still wanted to leave the European Union and that talks must start quickly. But Elmar Brok, a German conservative and the EU Parliament’s top Brexit expert, told the Ruhr Nachrichten newspaper the talks would now be more complicated. If she is to succeed in delivering the wishes of 52%  of the public and take Britain out of the EU, she must find a way to secure the full support of her party to pass legislation preparing for and enacting the departure. A failure to get legislation through parliament could eventually result in the need for another election.Fraught with riskAfter confirming on Friday that her top five ministers, including finance minister Philip Hammond, would keep their jobs, May must name the rest of her team, who will take on one of the most demanding jobs in recent British history. To govern, she will need the support of the socially conservative, pro-Brexit Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which won 10 seats in Northern Ireland. A senior Conservative lawmaker, Gavin Williamson, was in Belfast for talks with the party on Saturday, a spokeswoman for May’s office said. The two parties are broadly politically aligned, but it remains to be seen what price the DUP will demand for its support.