Putin repeats ‘nonsense’ claim Boris Johnson scuppered efforts to end Ukraine invasion

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Vladimir Putin has repeated a claim that Boris Johnson scuppered negotiations for a peace settlement between Russia and Ukraine, which the previous UK prime minister has beforehand labelled “nonsense”.

During a extremely anticipated sit-down interview with former Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson, the Russian president stated, through a translator, {that a} “huge document” had been ready and accepted by the pinnacle of the Ukranian delegation, earlier than Mr Johnson had stepped in and “dissuaded” Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky.

“He put his signature and then he himself said, ‘we were ready to sign it and the war would have been over long ago’. However, Prime Minister Johnson came talk to us out of it, and we’ve missed that chance. “

In an interview with The Times in January, Mr Johnson strongly denied the claims, which have been previously aired by Moscow, describing them as “total nonsense” and “Russian propaganda.”

Mr Johnson asserted that, throughout a dialog with Mr Zelensky following the peace talks in Istanbul, he had “expressed concerns” concerning the nature of the potential settlement, however assured him of the UK’s unwavering assist for Ukraine.

He added that: “No peace proposals or peace agreement were possible in February or March 2022. Russia entered Ukraine solely for the sake of seizing territories, killing citizens and overthrowing a democratic government.”

The former prime minister’s rebuttal got here following statements made by David Arahamiya, the chief of the Servant of the People occasion faction within the Verkhovna Rada and head of the Ukrainian delegation in talks with Russia, in November 2023.

Mr Arahamiya cited a earlier vist by Mr Johnson to Kyiv as forming a part of the choice not to negotiate with Moscow in 2022. Mr Johnson had allegedly stated that Ukraine “shouldn’t sign anything with them at all – and let’s just fight.”

Speaking of the proposed negotiations, Mr Putin continued: “We have never refused… and the fact that they obeyed the demand or persuasion of Mr Johnson, the former prime minister of Great Britain, seems ridiculous and very sad to me.

“Because as Mr Arahamiya put it, we could have stopped those hostilities with war a year and a half ago already. But the British persuaded us and we refused this. Where is Mr Johnson now? And the war continues.”

Asked the place he thought Mr Johnson was, Mr Putin laughed, replying: “Hell knows, i don’t understand it myself.”

Conspiracy theories about Mr Johnson’s potential involvement in peace negotiations between the 2 nations had been beforehand been bandied about by 2024 presidential hopeful Robert F Kennedy Jr.

“Looks like the Biden Administration deployed Boris Johnson to scuttle a tentative peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine in spring 2022. This was never about the Ukrainian people. It was always about engineering a war against Russia,” Mr Kennedy wrote on X/Twitter in June 2023.