A long, agonising divorce

“Boris Johnson has been trying to convince his Tory colleagues that negotiations have advanced in the last week or so and that there’s a possible breakthrough on the way, but it seems to me that very few if anyone believes that this is the case,” Agata Gostyńska-Jakubowska, a senior research fellow at think-tank the Centre for European Reform. “What you hear in Brussels and in the European capitals is quite a lot of frustration.”

Yet Brussels - however reluctantly - would still be willing to consider pressing pause on the process once more.

“They would ask if this extension is really helping matters and if it’s really helping to lead Brexit to its conclusion. Brexit is just one of the issues that the EU needs to deal with, and to many it is seen as a distraction,” Gostyńska-Jakubowska said.

“Having said that, I find it hard to imagine EU leaders to refusing an extension if Britain asked for it. The last thing the EU wants is to be blamed for pushing the UK off the cliff edge.”