13 January 2017 Erika Szyszczak is a Professor of Law at the University of Sussex, Barrister and ADR Mediator at Littleton Chambers, Temple and a Fellow of the UKTPO. EU trade policy has been cast into shadow by the sharp focus on how the UK will conduct its future trade policy. But it will be in the interests of the EU and the UK to negotiate their future trading relationship as quickly and smoothly as possible. An issue for the EU will be the question of whether it will have exclusive competence to negotiate and ratify a trade deal with the UK. Or will it be forced to acknowledge that any future agreement will be a mixed agreement requiring, and risking, ratification by all 27 Member States? Two events at the end of 2016 have shed light on the legal and political issues facing the EU in negotiating a post-Brexit world. […]