The German government has come out Wednesday to deny recent statements by former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in which he claimed that from Berlin Russia was given as the winner from the beginning of the war and have reproached him for having «his own relationship with the truth».
«We know that the very joking former prime minister always has his own relationship with the truth; in this case it is no different,» said German government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit, as shared on his Twitter account by the German ambassador to the UK, Miguel Berger.
Berlin’s response follows statements made by Johnson on Monday at the CNN delegation in Lisbon in which he assured that at a given moment Germany considered «better» a Russian attack so that «everything would end quickly and Ukraine would surrender».
«I could not support it, it seemed to me a disastrous vision», Johnson said, to then admit that he was able to understand «why they thought that way», since they claimed «all kinds of valid economic reasons».
Johnson, who regularly went to Kiev to support the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky – especially when a new controversy arose in the convulsive last months of his mandate – reproached other Western countries for not trusting in the resilience of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
In the case of France, he criticized that Paris denied weeks before the invasion that it would take place, while as regards Italy, Johnson affirmed that at first they said that they could not support London’s position due to the «massive» dependence on Russian hydrocarbons.
«What happened was that everybody, Germans, French, Italians, everybody,» including U.S. President Joe Biden, «saw that there was no choice because you can’t negotiate with this guy,» he said, referring to Vladimir Putin.
However, he then rushed to acknowledge the «brilliant» joint position of the European Union. «The EU has done brilliantly (…) I pay tribute to the way they have acted. They have pulled together. The sanctions were tough,» he acknowledged.
