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LONDON — Britain and France inched closer on Tuesday to a deal that would allow freight trucks to resume traveling between the two countries, raising hopes of relief for hundreds of drivers stuck near British ports and for supermarkets warning that they could soon run short of fruit and vegetables.
France closed its border for 48 hours on Sunday night, fearing the spread of a new and possibly more transmissible variant of the coronavirus in Britain. That left more than 1,500 trucks stranded in the southeast as the Port of Dover and the Eurotunnel were shut to outbound traffic. Some drivers slept in their trucks for two nights.
As talks to break the impasse continued, France was expected to reopen its borders, but only to French nationals, residents and workers like truck drivers, and only to those able to supply evidence of a recent negative test, according to France Info, a public radio station. All other travelers coming from Britain would be allowed in under the plan only if they had a permanent residence in France.
An agreement between France and Britain for reopening the border would stave off the fears that had arisen of shortages of lettuce, broccoli and citrus fruit in British shops. Even though trucks from France were still allowed to bring such goods into Britain, few chose to cross the border amid fears that drivers would get marooned there.
The negotiations came as the European Union urged member states to step back from the draconian travel bans imposed in recent days. The bloc’s executive urged countries to continue discouraging nonessential travel to and from Britain, but said that British and other European citizens should be allowed to return to their homes and that goods should be allowed to move back and forth.
Many scientists suspect that the new variant is already in continental Europe. And they stressed that travel bans were useful only if such measures gave countries time to minimize the spread of the virus within their borders and ramp up efforts to detect the new variant.
“Clearly, we need balance,” Emma Hodcroft, a researcher at the University of Bern in Switzerland, wrote on Twitter. “Act too soon with too little info and you generate panic without evidence — damaging economy, livelihoods and trust. But wait too long, and you could miss a vital window when we have the chance to have the most effective response.”
The discovery of the variant had led in recent days to a lockdown across much of southeastern England and bans on flights and trains between Britain and dozens of countries as they tried to stop the variant from spreading. The French government has said it wants to make testing mandatory for travelers coming from Britain.
And because the trucks passing between the two countries are continuously cycling through Europe, it would unblock a continentwide freight system that industry experts said could quickly grind to a halt.
Drivers stuck near British ports were given a single cereal bar by local officials on Monday, said Rod McKenzie, the director of policy at Road Haulage Association, which represents the road transport industry. While drivers pack their own food, he said, they usually do not take much more than they expect to need for their few hours in Britain.
“It’s a story of human misery,” Mr. McKenzie said. “The government planning has been shocking on this, and there are no adequate lavatory facilities on the motorway for the past couple of days with up to 1,000 trucks parked up.”
The British government introduced plans devised for similar problems at the border after the country finalizes its split from the European Union on Dec. 31. It shut off parts of a motorway to allow trucks to park on the road and opened an old airport with room for 4,000 trucks to park.
British commentators noted that the usefulness of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Brexit plans for a once-in-a-century pandemic did not do much to raise people’s confidence about how the country will fare if it crashes out of the European Union without a deal governing future commercial relations across the English Channel at the end of this month.
Scientists also noted that the new variant’s discovery in Britain did not mean an absence from the rest of Europe. Britain does considerably more genomic sequencing than other countries, allowing it to detect mutations more quickly.
“If you were going to pick it up anywhere, you were going to pick it up in the U.K.,” said Thomas Connor, a professor specializing in pathogen variation at Cardiff University in Wales. “The question for other countries around the world is: What capacity do they have to actually start undertaking some surveillance using genomic sequencing to be able to actually get an idea of what’s circulating there?”
In light of the unlikelihood that the variant is confined to Britain, the European Commission, the bloc’s executive, recommended on Tuesday that member states lift blanket bans on travelers from Britain.
It also urged countries not to impose cumbersome and time-consuming requirements for the most thorough coronavirus tests on truck drivers, but rather to rely on more rapid tests while ensuring that any such measures do not disrupt the flow of goods.
“While it is important to take swift temporary precautionary action to limit the further spread of the new strain of the virus and all nonessential travel to and from the U.K. should be discouraged, essential travel and transit of passengers should be facilitated,” the Commission said in a statement. “Flight and train bans should be discontinued given the need to ensure essential travel and avoid supply chain disruptions.”
Addressing the issue of European Union citizens stuck in Britain and British people stuck elsewhere on the continent, the commission said they should be exempted from any temporary blockades and allowed to return home.
Those “traveling to their member state or country of residence as well as third-country nationals that enjoy E.U. free movement rights should be exempted from further temporary restrictions provided that they undergo a test or quarantine,” the recommendation said.
Eshe Nelson contributed reporting from London, and Matina Stevis-Gridneff from Brussels.
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