Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson slammed French President Emmanuel Macron at the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, accusing him of being a “Putin bootlick,” his ex-boyfriend claimed on Thursday. communications director.
In early March 2022, when tens of thousands of Ukrainians fled their country ahead of the February 24 Russian invasion, British media and several European countries criticized the small number of refugees admitted to the UK. “Macron went a step further by criticizing Boris very directly and his comments made the front page of The Guardian, I think, on a Friday,” Guto Harri, the former prime minister’s former communications director, recalled in a new one Episode of his “Unprecedented” podcast uploaded on Thursday.
“We must rage against the ‘frogs'”
During a meeting with his advisors, he “launched a vehement attack on Emmanuel Macron, calling him a word that started with a C (obviously referring to “asshole”) and saying he was a psychopath, he was Putin’s toady “, he says. We “have to take the gloves off”, “we have to rage against the ‘frogs'” (frogs – a derogatory nickname by the French), Boris Johnson would have said, according to this adviser.
The UK and its leaders, an early supporter of Kiev in the conflict with Russia, were already skeptical of French President’s attempts to persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin not to invade Ukraine. The visit of the French President to Moscow a few weeks before the start of the conflict made Boris Johnson “sick”, according to Harri.
“Show the world our bromance is alive”
However, says this adviser, the two leaders would then have reconciled. “At a G7 summit they drank a whiskey together (…) and gave each other ‘my friend’, ‘enchanted Emmanuel'” and Boris Johnson invited Macron to London “so that we could show the world that our ‘Bromance ‘ is ‘alive’.
A spokesman for Boris Johnson declined to comment on his former adviser’s comments on the grounds that the former Prime Minister was not involved with the podcast. According to official figures, the UK has issued nearly 230,000 visas to Ukrainians since the war began.