Northern Ireland minister orders halt to Brexit agri-food checks

DUP's Edwin Poots says he has ordered top civil servant to stop port checks, but not clear whether he will comply

Northern Ireland's agriculture minister has ordered all Brexit checks on food and farm products to be stopped from midnight in a unilateral move that will set him on a collision course with Brussels.

The former leader of the Democratic Unionist party Edwin Poots threatened the move last week after he failed to get the backing of other parties in Stormont to intervene in the face of a delayed resolution to the dispute over the Northern Ireland protocol.