Ambushed by EU, Boris runs for cover
The British prime minister went to Luxembourg as a favour to Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European Commission, and walked straight into an ambush.
Boris Johnson was meant to be holding a joint outdoor press conference with Xavier Bettel, the prime minister of Luxembourg after meeting Juncker. However, he cancelled, fearing his words would be drowned out by a band of 75 vocal anti-Brexit protesters ranged just 10m away.
Bettel took full advantage. Gesticulating to the empty podium beside him, he said Brexit was a ‘‘nightmare’’, before criticising the referendum campaign. He refused to say whether he trusted Johnson.
The EU was behind the Irish, he added, before mocking Johnson’s invocation of The Incredible Hulk poised to burst free from the manacles of the EU.
As for the prime minister’s vow to break the law rather than ask for a Brexit extension, ‘‘that wouldn’t happen in Luxembourg’’ – and it was Johnson’s responsibility to find a solution to the deadlock, he continued. People in Britain and the EU needed certainty, he said.
‘‘You can’t hold the future hostage for party political gain,’’ he went on, to applause from the protesters.
Rather than being able to claim momentum was building behind a compromise deal on the Irish border backstop, Johnson, who tried to rescue the situation with a pooled television clip filmed elsewhere, was humiliated.
The crowd outside the Mansfield Building, Luxembourg’s Ministry of State, may have been small by British standards, but by the standards of the Grand Duchy (population 600,000) it was quite something.
As the leaders began to arrive at the building, the throng shouted ‘‘save us’’ to Bettel, who told them they were welcome. ‘‘That’s democracy,’’ the avowed europhile said.
When Johnson arrived at 3.06pm, the crowd, which had earlier applauded Michel Barnier, erupted into deafening boos.
A protester with a microphone called on the demonstrators to drown out Johnson during the press conference.
Challenged on this by a cameraman, he said the prime minister ‘‘had nothing to say worth hearing’’.
The demonstrators, a mix of expats living in the city state, began running through their repertoire of chants between recordings of Elgar’s Enigma Variations, Send in the Clowns, Eton Rifles by The Jam and Satisfaction by The Rolling Stones.
The protest’s musical aspect may have stemmed from its organiser, David Pike, a classical baritone singer with joint Canadian, British and Luxemburger nationality. He sang Ode to Joy, the EU’s anthem.
Behind the scenes, nerves were fraying. Downing Street asked if the press conference could be moved inside. Luxembourg officials countered there was no room large enough. When Downing Street suggested a conference of selected journalists instead, they were rebuffed. That wouldn’t be fair to the other reporters, they were told.
An hour after he arrived, Johnson and Bettel walked out into the square to be greeted with a cacophony of booing.
Johnson strode, smiling weakly, to his car, ignoring the cry of: ‘‘Why are you running away, prime minister?’’
A smiling Bettel returned to his podium, the British flag behind him, and the empty lectern, which had not been moved it was said, because it was wired to the speakers.
Juncker could only meet Johnson in his native Luxembourg as he needed to be in the European Parliament in Strasbourg that evening.
In truth, it suited the British to avoid the sight of a British prime minister going to Brussels with a begging bowl in hand.
The two men met in a private room at Le Bouquet Garni, an 18th century restaurant nestled close to the Grand Ducal Palace of Luxembourg boasting French cooking, soft lighting, exposed stones and a period fireplace.