Who is telling the truth? Shortly before the Russian attack on Ukraine, British Prime Minister Johnson was still trying to prevent the worst from happening. According to Johnson, Russian President Putin threatened to use military force. However, the Kremlin denies this.
According to British ex-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Russian President Vladimir Putin made personal threats against Johnson shortly before the start of the Ukraine war. “He kind of threatened me at one point and said, ‘Boris, I don’t want to hurt you, but with a missile it would only take a minute’ or something like that,” Johnson said in a BBC documentary to be aired this Monday target. However, the Kremlin denies this.
“Judging by the very relaxed tone and the level of composure he seemed to display, he must have been toying with my attempts to get him to negotiate,” Johnson continued. Like other Western leaders, the then prime minister had tried to divert Putin from his course shortly before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In a “very long” phone call in February 2022, Johnson warned that the war would be a “total disaster”. The statements are said to have been made.
Johnson told Putin that an invasion of Ukraine would lead to Western sanctions and more NATO troops on Russia’s borders. He also tried to discourage Russia from military action by telling Putin that Ukraine would not join NATO “anytime soon”. The Russian President was “very familiar” during the “highly extraordinary call,” Johnson said.
However, the Kremlin has denied Johnson’s statements about alleged threats. “What Mr Johnson said is not true. More precisely, it is a lie,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the Russian news agency Interfax. According to Moscow, the phrase about the rocket never came out. It was either a deliberate lie, or Johnson simply didn’t understand what Putin was talking to him about, Peskov said.
Boris Johnson had visited the attacked Ukraine early on and promised support to Kyiv. In July 2022, under pressure from his party, he resigned as Conservative leader and prime minister. Even after his resignation, Johnson recently visited Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and campaigned for arms deliveries.
