European Commission drops plan to ban UK from science projects

Move comes after concerns from diplomats Britain was being treated as if it posed a similar risk to China

The European Commission has dropped plans for a blanket ban on UK involvement in EU research on space projects and supercomputers after a backlash from member states and leading scientists.

Thierry Breton, the former French finance minister who is now the EU internal market commissioner, had claimed the EU needed to keep control of intellectual property and that the UK's involvement was an unacceptable security risk.