Downing Street rubbish European Union official’s claims Brexit will be triggered in January

“V4 countries will be uncompromising”, said Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, after an EU Summit in the capital Bratislava.

The Visegrad Four (V4) – the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia – want a guarantee that their nationals “are equal” before agreeing to any Brexit deal.

The European council president, Donald Tusk, said the British prime minister, Theresa May, had told him article 50 was likely to be triggered in January or February next year, dashing remain voters’ hopes of delaying the UK’s departure from the EU.

Donald Tusk let slip, at a summit in Bratislava, that Theresa May wants to begin the formal process to extract Britain from the European Union by February 2017.

“All the legislative procedures concerning the matter have been carried out”, he said, adding that his country would offer its full support to ensure the force was deployed. “I think Britain knows this is an issue for us where there’s no room for compromise”.

However, yesterday a Downing Street source said the PM did not specifically mention January or February at the meeting and that Tusk’s comments were an interpretation of the conversation.

United Kingdom exit negotiations are expected to start in early 2017 and to last at least two years, with the United Kingdom retaining its full rights in the EU Council during that period.

The UK would exercise its power of veto to block the creation of an EU army while it remains a member of the European Union, according to Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon.

His statement came after European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker called earlier this week for a new EU border and coastguard force to start work quickly with 200 guards and 50 vehicles deployed in Bulgaria by October.

EU officials on Friday also underlined that there could be no granting Britain access to the EU’s single market unless London accepts the freedom of movement of workers that lies at the heart of European Union accords.

The Union will support its member countries in guaranteeing their internal security, while the exchange of information between individual countries must be intensified, in addition to providing a boost to European cooperation in external security and defence, he said.

Speaking to The Times, Fallon said the EU’s plan to create a “common military force” is “not going to happen”.

“We have always been concerned about unnecessarily duplicating what we already have in Nato”, Sir Michael said.

At an end of the summit on Friday, Mr Fico said that he and other Central European leaders whose citizens make up much of the EU migrant population in Britain would not let those people become “second class citizens”.

“The creation of a European army will only encourage isolationists in the United States to argue that Europe should be responsible for its own defence”.

“At a time when few of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation countries can meet the minimum requirement of 2% of GDP defence expenditure, parallel headquarters and staff make no sense whatsoever”.

Mr Tusk, who chaired the meeting, said: “It was a sad moment for Europe when the British people made a decision to leave”.