May will meet European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and then European Council President Donald Tusk in Brussels on Thursday.

Rebuffing May's bid to renegotiate just a day before she is due in Brussels, Tusk said he wished the United Kingdom would reverse Brexit but that the bloc was preparing for a disorderly British exit as it would not gamble on peace in Ireland.

The BBC has come under fire after headlining an article as Donald Tusk saying that there's a "special place in hell for Brexiteers", when a fuller version of the quote clarified that he was referring to "those who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan of how to carry it out safely".

In a message to Mrs May, Mr Tusk said: "Give us a deliverable guarantee for peace in Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom will leave the European Union as a trusted friend".

Donald Tusk made the comments at a joint press conference with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar in Brussels.

'Today there is no political force and no effective leadership for Remain.

They are discussing preparations for a "no deal" Brexit in the event that the Withdrawal Agreement is not ratified.

He said "from rapidly growing creative firms trading with South Korea to specialist machinery firms trading with Mexico, these EU Free Trade Agreements have supported firms of all sizes to grow and could be lost overnight".

But Tusk, standing by Irish leader Leo Varadkar, warned once again that the divorce deal May agreed a year ago but failed to sell to her parliament will not be reopened.

"The backstop is part of the withdrawal agreement and we can not reopen the discussion on the backstop".

"You are not going to convince me that anything Donald Tusk says could further harden the position of the Boris Johnsons' or the Rees-Moggs' of this world", she said.

The Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which has propped up May's government since she lost her parliamentary majority in a 2017 snap election, said it wanted to get a deal agreed but the border backstop had to be replaced.

Commons Leader Andrea Leadsom, who backed Brexit in the referendum, branded Mr Tusk "spiteful" and demanded he apologise.

While Mr Varadkar met the EU's leaders, Mrs May held meetings with all five of the main Northern Irish parties at Stormont House in Belfast.

May was holding meetings with top DUP officials on Wednesday, hoping to reach a compromise as the March 29 Brexit deadline looms.

Mr Varadkar was more timid in his remarks, but said events in Westminster over recent weeks "demonstrate exactly why we need a legal guarantee" that a hard border can not emerge.

She told an audience of business leaders and journalists that she wanted to "affirm my commitment to delivering a Brexit that ensures no return to a hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland, which is unshakeable".