U.K. and EU Reach Brexit Deal, Setting Up Crucial Weekend Vote

The draft agreement comes after weeks of negotiations and will be voted on by both the EU and the U.K. this week.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson shakes hands with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker during a press point at EU headquarters in Brussels, on Thursday.

THE U.K AND THE European Union on Thursday agreed to a draft Brexit deal, teeing up a crucial vote in the British Parliament this weekend as the deadline for the U.K to leave the bloc bears down.

The looming vote will be the ultimate test for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who campaigned on renegotiating the divorce deal and delivering Brexit without another delay but faced humiliating defeats in Parliament and the courts during his first several months as the country's leader.

Should the deal not prevail in Parliament, Johnson may call for a snap election, essentially throwing the decision to the people of Great Britain. But Johnson appears to be gambling on the fact that lawmakers are ready to wash their hands of the Brexit conundrum after years of tedious negotiations and delays.

The draft deal comes after weeks of frenzied negotiations between the British government and the EU.

"We have a deal. And this deal means that there is no need for need for any kind of prolongation," European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said Thursday at a press conference with Johnson, referring to another delay.

Junker went on to call the deal a "fair, balanced agreement." All 27 members of the EU will need to approve the plan at a summit that begins Thursday.

Johnson echoed Juncker, calling the plan a "very good deal."

"For us in the U.K., it means that we can deliver a real Brexit that achieves our objectives, and it means that the U.K. leaves – whole and entire – on October the 31st," Johnson said.

Jonhson faces steep odds of getting the plan through Parliament. Importantly, Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party – a small but crucial voting bloc that props up the Conservative government – said it will not back the plan.

"These proposals are not, in our view, beneficial to the economic well-being of Northern Ireland and they undermine the integrity of the Union," the party said in a statement.

The DUP's concerns – and the meat of the negotiations between the EU and the U.K. – center on a plan to avoid a hard border between Northern Ireland, part of the U.K., and the Republic of Ireland, a sovereign nation.

Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the opposition Labour Party, urged lawmakers to oppose the plan and said the deal sounded "even worse" than the one negotiated by former Prime Minister Theresa May.

Brexit was originally planned for March but was delayed after Parliament on three occasions rejected a withdrawal plan negotiated between the EU and May's government, ultimately leading to May's resignation in the summer.

The Ireland quagmire sunk May's deal and threatens to do the same to Johnson's. Johnson's deal leaves much of May's plan intact but alters a provision known as the "Irish backstop," a mechanism to avoid the hard border in Ireland. The dissolution of a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland helped to end decades of violence and political unrest.

Unlike May's deal, which kept Northern Ireland in a customs union with the EU in the event that another protocol could not be agreed upon, Johnson's deal removes the whole of the U.K. from the EU customs union, meaning that it will not be bound by EU trade rules and will be able to negotiate trade deals with other countries.

Instead, there will be a legal customs border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. In practice, however, the customs border will be between Great Britain and the island of Ireland, with goods being checked at Northern Irish ports, according to an analysis of the draft deal by the BBC.