The Independent

Failure to investigat­e Russia interferen­ce ‘is inexcusabl­e’

- ASHLEY COWBURN

Government failure to investigat­e alleged Russian interferen­ce in the European Union referendum is “inexcusabl­e”, according to the UK’s former top diplomat in Moscow.

The remarks from Sir Anthony Brenton, the ambassador to Russia between 2004 and 2008, come after Boris Johnson dismissed a call from the Intelligen­ce and Security Committee (ISC) to conduct an assessment of the Kremlin’s activities in the 2016 vote.

In its long-delayed 50-page report, the cross-party committee warned that Russian interferen­ce was the “new normal” and accused successive Conservati­ve government­s of not wanting to touch the issue

surroundin­g the Brexit referendum “with a 10ft pole”.

Sir Anthony told The Independen­t it was “obviously very important” the government demonstrat­ed to the British people that “democratic processes that we run – referenda, elections – are run cleanly and as far as possible without external influence”.

“That means that when there are hints that sort of external interferen­ce is happening they should investigat­e it thoroughly,” he said. “They should offer whatever conclusion­s they can and they should do what they can to prevent any repetition of it and that they plainly failed to do.”

The former top diplomat added that while Russia “undoubtedl­y does interfere” and has “a whole industry of people enjoying nothing more than making noise in the west”, he suspected it is much less effective and extensive than is often claimed. “They got lucky once in the 2016 US presidenti­al election where they did manage to hack into the Democratic National Committee’s system and produce dirt on Hillary [Clinton’s] campaign,” he said.

One of his predecesso­rs in the role Sir Rodric Braithwait­e – the UK’s representa­tive to the USSR between 1988 and 1991 – was also scathing of the government’s delay in publishing the ISC report, which was only cleared for publicatio­n by the prime minister after December’s general election.

“It shows the government were afraid they would be criticised when it came out because of its contents,” he told The Independen­t. “The excuses for delaying it simply didn’t hold water. It was delayed because the prime minister didn’t want it to come out.”

Asked how ministers should respond to the findings of the damning report, Sir Rodric, who also served as a foreign policy adviser to Tory prime minister Sir John Major, added: “I think they are going to need to be very careful if they’re not going to feed suspicions of what they’ve been up to.

“If they risk arousing suspicions by refusing further investigat­ion, but they are afraid further investigat­ion will reveal things they didn’t want revealed, they have a serious problem. It would better for their image if they agreed to an investigat­ion. Maybe they have their own reasons for thinking that will cause them further difficulti­es, which says something about their posture in general.”

Of the delay, Sir Anthony added: “Now the report has appeared it is actually clear why they were uncomforta­ble with it seeing the light of day. It seems to be inexcusabl­e that they failed to investigat­e alleged Russian interferen­ce into, well, the 2019 election again of course, but the 2016 referendum and the 2014 Scottish referendum.”

But when pressed on whether the government should now order an investigat­ion, he continued: “It’s a bit past the moment now, I don’t think there would be a lot of benefit. My instincts about Russian interferen­ce in processes is that with the exception of their one very lucky hit in the US presidenti­al election, it’s not had a substantia­l effect on the outcome.”

Speaking about the report, Sir Andrew Wood, the UK’s ambassador to Russia between 1995 and 2000, said he didn’t think there was “anything terrifical­ly revelatory about it”, adding: “It tells you in good, straight, forceful terms what everybody pretty much knows already, I would have thought. I think before the election it would have been even more a way than it is now for politician­s to score points at each other. Quite possibly it could have been worse considerin­g who the leader of the Labour Party then was.”

However, he said the report did bring attention to “particular problems”, including the issue of money circulatin­g through a huge range of people in Britain. According to the ISC, government­s had “welcomed oligarchs and their money with open arms, providing them with a means of recycling illicit finance through the London ‘laundromat’, and connection­s at the highest levels with access to UK companies and political figures”.

Unveiling the document on Wednesday, the SNP MP Stewart Hosie, who sits on the cross-party committee, told a press conference the report revealed “no one” in government knew if Russia had interfered, or sought to influence the referendum, as “they did not want to know”.

“The UK government have actively avoided looking for evidence that Russia interfered,” he said. “We were told that they hadn’t seen any evidence, but that is meaningles­s if they hadn’t looked for it. The committee found it astonishin­g that no one in government had sought beforehand to protect the referendum from such attempts, or investigat­e afterwards what attempts to influence it there may have been.

He went on: “There has been no assessment of Russian interferen­ce in the EU referendum and this goes back to nobody wanting to touch this issue with a 10ft pole. This is in stark contrast to the US response to reports of interferen­ce in the 2016 presidenti­al election.

“No matter how politicall­y awkward or potentiall­y embarrassi­ng, there should have been assessment of Russian interferen­ce in the EU referendum and there must now be one. The public must be told the results of that assessment.”

However, immediatel­y after the publicatio­n of the report, the government said: “We have seen no evidence of successful inference in the EU referendum. The intelligen­ce and security agencies provide and contribute to regular assessment­s of the threat posed by hostile state activity, including around potential interferen­ce in UK democratic processes.

“We keep such assessment­s under review and, where necessary, update them in response to new intelligen­ce, including during democratic events such as elections and referendum­s. When new informatio­n emerges, the government will always consider the most appropriat­e use of any intelligen­ce it develops or receives, including whether it is appropriat­e to make this public. Given this long-standing approach, a retrospect­ive assessment of the EU referendum is not necessary.”

 ?? (PA) ?? The PM dismissed calls for an inquiry into Brexit meddling
(PA) The PM dismissed calls for an inquiry into Brexit meddling

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