Hopes are mounting of an imminent Brexit breakthrough over the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Talks between the UK and EU aimed at smashing the deadlock resume this week amid mounting pressure on the sides to thrash out a solution.
Northern Ireland Minister Steve Baker paved the way for a deal when he apologised for his "ferocious" stance on negotiations with the bloc.
He told the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham that relations with Ireland were not "where they should be", and admitted ministers needed to act with "humility" to restore links with the Republic and EU.
Mr Baker insisted he was "convinced" London and Brussels can "get a deal which works for everyone" if they enter talks "together in a spirit of goodwill" and without preconditions.
Critics say the Protocol, which effectively keeps the province in the EU’s Single Market for goods, has drawn a border down the Irish Sea - hampering trade between mainland Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
But supporters believe the mechanism is key to preventing a hard border on the province’s 310-mile frontier with the Republic - the UK's only land boundary with the EU.
Rows over the Protocol have helped cripple the Stormont Assembly, where the Democratic Unionist Party refuses to take its seats while the issue remains unresolved.
Unionists claim the ongoing row could threaten the 1998 Good Friday Agreement which brought peace to the province.
The clock is ticking on the deadline for a pact.
Legislation allowing the UK Government to effectively tear up parts of the Protocol returns to Parliament on October 11.
The Northern Ireland Protocol Bill has already cleared the Commons and will be debated by the Lords next week.
European Commission spokesman Daniel Ferrie said the EU would approach negotiations "constructively" and the bloc remained "committed to finding joint solutions".
Prime Minister Liz Truss meets European leaders in Prague on Thursday, raising hopes the impasse with the EU could finally be overcome.
Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy said: “For months Labour has been calling for the Government to get round the negotiating table with the EU to fix the bad deal it negotiated.
"There is a window now the Government must not squander.
“With hard work and compromise on all sides, a deal is achievable to end this damaging, self-inflicted standoff.”
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly fuelled hopes of an agreement last night.
Speaking on the conference fringe at a drinks reception hosted by the EU’s Ambassador to the UK, João Vale de Almeida, he told diplomats that problems between Britain and the bloc were always sorted eventually.
“We look to overcome our challenges, we look to overcome our difficulties, and I have no doubt that we will,” he said.
“Sometimes it may take a little bit longer than we would like and and sometimes the route might be a little bit meandering, but I have no doubt that we will get to that good place because it is the inevitably positive outcome.”
In a thinly-veiled reference to the Protocol, Mr de Almeida admitted there were “issues where we still have situations we need to overcome”.
But he added: “I am inspired by what has been happening in the last few weeks on the mutual willingness to engage in order to find common solutions.”
