Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told the BBC that shortly before the start of the war, during a conversation with Vladimir Putin, he called the invasion of Ukraine a «complete disaster», then the Russian president threatened him with a «rocket».< /p>
According to the British official, the dialogue with Putin took place in February last year. According to Johnson, he warned the president about imposing sanctions and increasing the number of NATO troops on the border with Russia in the event of a war. The Prime Minister also said that «in the foreseeable future» Ukraine will not join the organization.
“At some point, he (Putin – MZ) started threatening me and said: ‘Boris, I don’t want to hurt you, but with a rocket it will only take a minute’, or something like that. Fun,” Johnson recalled. The official also noted that Putin had a «relaxed tone» and looked aloof. The prime minister added: «He was just playing along with my attempts to get him to negotiate.»
In addition, in the BBC documentary «Putin vs. the West», British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said that on February 11 he flew to Moscow to meet with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu, who assured him that there would be no war. . The British spokesman described the conversation as «a show of intimidation or force».
“That is: I am going to lie to you, you know that I am lying, and I know that you know that I am lying, and I will continue to lie to you,” Wallace described the meeting with Shoigu. Also, according to him, Valery Gerasimov, who at that time held the position of Chief of the General Staff, told the British Minister that “we will never be humiliated again.”
Later, Johnson's words were commented on by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, calling them «a conscious lie.»
“Or it was unconscious, and in fact he did not understand what President Putin was talking to him about. Then it becomes a little uncomfortable for the interlocutors of our president, ”Mayak radio quoted Peskov as saying.
According to a Kremlin spokesman, Putin told Johnson that if Ukraine joined NATO, “the potential deployment of NATO or American missiles at our borders would mean that any missile would reach Moscow in a matter of minutes».
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Updated at 13:10. Added Peskov's comment.