When British Prime Minister Theresa May meets with European Union leaders during a two-day gathering in Egypt's Sharm el Sheikh on Sunday, she'll be hoping for a breakthrough in her beleaguered Brexit deal ahead of a crucial vote in Parliament later this week.
May is in Egypt for an EU-League of Arab States summit, where she is also expected to hold talks with key EU figures, including European Council President Donald Tusk.
The gathering comes just days before MPs will on Wednesday decide whether to delay Brexit -- set by law to occur on March 29 -- in order to prevent Britain exiting the EU without a deal.
The biggest sticking point in the deal remains the Northern Ireland backstop, and despite repeated trips to Brussels to seek reassurances from EU leaders, May has so far been unable to convince MPs back home to back her Withdrawal Agreement.
Just hours before setting off for Egypt, May told a closed meeting of grassroots Conservatives that Britain's exit from the EU must not be "frustrated," according to details of her speech released by Downing Street.
"We must not, and I will not, frustrate what was the largest democratic exercise in this country's history," May said at the National Conservative Convention (NCC) in Oxford on Saturday. "In the very final stages of this process, the worst thing we could do is lose our focus," she added.
The comments came shortly after three UK Cabinet ministers wrote they were prepared to defy Prime Minsiter Theresa May and vote to extend Article 50 -- the legal process for leaving the EU -- in an effort to prevent a "disastrous" no-deal.
Writing in the UK's Daily Mail newspaper, cabinet members Amber Rudd, David Gauke and Greg Clark said they would vote for a delay unless there is a breakthrough this week.
"It would be better to seek to extend Article 50 and delay our date of departure rather than crash out of the European Union on March 29," the trio wrote in the article, published Saturday.
It's a view shared by former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown, who writing in UK newspaper the Sunday Mirror, said extending Article 50 would "let us reflect, reconsider and renegotiate Mrs May's botched terms."
"We have only three days to draw back from the brink," he added.
Brexit splits
The senior ministers' warning comes just days after three Conservative lawmakers quit the party over what they called May's "disastrous" handling of Brexit, and the party's shift to the right, joining eight former Labour MPs to form a new parliamentary bloc.
Speaking to Conservative party members on Saturday, May sought to stem further high-profile resignations, saying "We are not a party of purges and retribution," the UK's Press Association reported. "We called a referendum and let people express their views -- so we should not be seeking to deselect any of our MPs because of their views on Brexit," she added.
May said the party was a "broad church" of views on Brexit and various other issues. A fitting statement, given the spiritual head of the Church of England, Justin Welby, could be set to lead five days of prayer with other church leaders, after Britain's exit from the EU, the Sunday Times reported.
The Archbishop of Cantebury wants to pray in public with the leaders of the Catholic, Methodist, Baptist and United Reformed churches on the day after Britain leaves, in an effort to ease Brexit divisions, a senior Church of England source told the UK newspaper.
It's possible that May's bedeviled Brexit deal could use a little divine assistance to have any hope of coming into force before March 29.
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