Moscow thinks he’s a mule .. and his name is even Boris
Kremlin cringe-fest after clown’s crisps jibe
BORIS Johnson took a public pasting from his Russian counterpart over Crimea and Moscow’s alleged cyber attacks on the West yesterday.
Sergey Lavrov, who met Johnson in Moscow, denied claims the Kremlin had interfered in democratic elections online and accused BoJo of being a “hostage” of untrue Western narratives on the issue.
In a series of extraordinary exchanges, Johnson insisted there was “abundant evidence” of Russian interference in polls in the US, Germany, Denmark and France.
When the Russian foreign minister told a press conference in Moscow that Johnson himself had confirmed Russia had not interfered in the UK’s election and Brexit referendum, the Foreign Secretary interrupted to say: “Not successfully.”
The clash came after Johnson issued a warning to the Kremlin that Britain was “prepared and able” to respond in kind to cyber attacks.
But instead of taking the chance to press home the Government’s serious concerns about Russian interference in Western democracies, BoJo mocked Lavrov and poked fun at Russia’s culture and history.
At one point, he made a “joke” about Britain exporting Kettle Chip crisps to Russia which was so embarrassing the official interpreter declined to translate it.
Johnson said: “I’m delighted to say there are increasing exports of British Kettle Chips to Russia, and, in spite of all the difficulties, 300 Bentleys were sold this year in Russia – not, I believe, necessarily to employees of the foreign ministry.” Speaking after more than an hour of talks on the first visit to Russia by a British foreign secretary for five years, both men acknowledged relations between the countries were at their worst for a long time.
But they accepted their countries had a duty to work together as fellow permanent members of the UN Security Council on issues affecting global security like Syria, Iran and North Korea.
The two men insisted they had established a level of personal trust, with Johnson joking that he had even handed his coat with “everything in my pockets,
secret or otherwise” to Lavrov when he arrived at the ministry of foreign affairs building.
Lavrov responded by saying: “I can say that there was nothing in the pockets of Boris’s coat,” to which Johnson replied: “So you have searched it already?”
The discussions then got serious when Johnson rejected Lavrov’s denial that Russia had attempted to interfere in British polls.
The Russian foreign minister hit back: “He is afraid if he doesn’t contradict me his reputation is going to be ruined.”
Lavrov criticised Britain for cutting off ties with the FSB security agency over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London, complaining that UK authorities had refused to hand over information on the case.
And he said that Government criticism of politicians who speak to Russian media outlets like the RT TV channel, on which former first minister Alex Salmond has his own show, did not reflect well on the UK.
He said: “We are concerned that the cradle of democracy, the United Kingdom, sees the vilifying of people for speaking to Russian media.” In a move likely to further aggravate his Russian hosts, Johnson later laid a bunch of red roses at the spot on Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge where opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was assassinated in 2015.
Johnson also met representatives of Russian human rights and civil society organisations at the residence of the UK ambassador.
Tania Lokshina, of Human Rights Watch, said that the authorities were prosecuting critics of the Vladimir Putin regime’s activities in Syria and Ukraine and shutting down websites which acted as independent voices.
Lokshina said: “This is the worst human rights crisis since the fall of the Soviet Union – the worst that we have seen in Russia’s contemporary history.”
In an apparent criticism of Putin’s record on press freedom, Johnson told students at Plekhanov University that “a society where journalists are shot because they investigate the business doings of the rich and powerful” was likely to be less prosperous.
The Foreign Secretary said: “The more tolerant a society is, the more supportive of free speech it is, the more likely that society is to be rich and successful.”
I’m delighted to say there are increasing exports of kettle chips to Russia BORIS JOHNSON