In all areas, the UK continues to backtrack.

The European Union argues that we should be subject to rules of the club that we have left.

The precondition is the level playing field.

We can deliver a real Brexit that achieves our objectives.

But if there is not a deal, we still need the Irish protocol or the Northern Irish protocol fully implemented.

I'm going to miss being the pantomime villain. Hello. protocol or the Northern Irish protocol fully implemented.

I'm going to miss being the pantomime villain.

Hello and welcome to Brexit Republic, RTE's podcast on Brexit.

I'm Tony Connolly, RTE's Europe editor in Brussels.

And I'm Colombeau Mungain, RTE's Deputy Foreign Editor in Dublin. We've paused the podcast due to commitments linked to the war in Ukraine, but we have a special

edition this week to assess the latest flare-up around the Northern Ireland Protocol.

Yes, it hasn't gone away, you know.

Next week, Boris Johnson will give a speech in which he'll promise to dismantle the protocol

through UK legislation unless the EU fundamentally changes it.

It follows days of hardening rhetoric from London in the wake of last week's Northern Ireland Assembly elections

in which Sinn Féin became the largest party and the DUP lost four seats.

With the DUP saying it will not return to Stormont unless the protocol has been dealt with,

even if that takes a string of elections, the temperature has reached boiling point,

and relations between Dublin, London and London and Brussels have sunk to even lower levels.

We'll piece together all the latest developments with contributions from David Frost and

Connor Burns in Washington,

Jeffrey Donaldson and Simon Coveney in Belfast and Mara Shefftiewicz in Brussels and a couple of

...