The commission will publish its no-deal contingency plans later this morning
An update from France 24 Brussels correspondent, Dave Keating:
A capitulation at today's #EUCO seems extremely unlikely. Italian PM Conte said "the EU must not give a millimetre," on its level playing field position.
Merkel said EU "ready to go down path of no deal" if UK can't accept level playing field. Macron said France would veto.EU prime ministers and presidents won't even debate #Brexit today, a senior EU official says. At most there will be a short update from VDL. Instead, the Commission will publish its #NoDealBrexit contingency plans this morning.
Assumption is now no deal, unless Johnson moves.
The capitulation he is referring to is more so to do with infighting among member states that would see the EU concede to Johnson's demands on key issues.
If that isn't going to happen and the EU and UK continues to play the poker game, the risk is that we might not get anything constructive come the end of the week.
Again, they might miss out on the "deadline" this week but 31 December arguably remains the key date to be mindful about in this whole saga.
