Rishi Sunak will meet Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, tomorrow to solve a “range of complex challenges around the Protocol on Ireland and Northern Ireland”.
The prime minister and president released a joint statement saying they agreed to “continue their work in person towards shared, practical solutions for the range of complex challenges around the Protocol on Ireland and Northern Ireland.
“President von der Leyen will therefore meet with the prime minister in the UK tomorrow.”
The government and the European Union have spent months negotiating changes to the contentious Northern Ireland Protocol, the mechanism preventing a hard border on the island of Ireland.
It was agreed as part of Boris Johnson’s “oven-ready” Brexit deal in order to preserve peace in the region – but unionists have been unhappy about the economic barriers it has created on trade being shipped from Great Britain to NI, with a customs border effectively imposed in the Irish Sea.
The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has refused to form an executive in Stormont unless the protocol is scrapped, leaving the assembly unable to function since early last year.
The UK government also previously said the protocol was not working and threatened to rip it up without the permission of the EU, a move branded by Brussels as “illegal and unrealistic”.
However, there has been a cooling of tensions under Mr Sunak’s administration, with both sides engaging in intense talks to resolve the impasse.
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Delivering the deal will avoid a trade war with the EU and be seen as a huge accomplishment for the prime minister, but unionist parties will have to be on board to restore powersharing.
The DUP has set out seven tests it wants any new deal to pass, including no checks on goods between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.
There is also anger about the so-called called “democratic deficit” caused by NI still being subject to some EU rules so that goods can move freely into the Republic of Ireland – which the DUP and many Tory MPs see as an erosion of the UK’s sovereignty and incompatible with the aims of Brexit.
Ministers have been hoping for a deal before the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, which was signed on 10 April 1998 and brought peace to Northern Ireland. Power-sharing was a fundamental principle.
Mr Sunak has previously indicated MPs will get a vote on the final deal, though his spokesman later played this down.
Labour has offered to support the prime minister if he comes up against a Tory rebellion, saying it is in the “national interest” to resolve the issues.
