LONDON: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is nothing like Winston Churchill but someone who tells lies about the European Union, according to the grandson of Britain’s wartime leader who was sacked from the Conservative Party this week.
Nicholas Soames, 71, the son of Mary Soames, the youngest of Churchill’s five children, was expelled from Johnson’s party after defying party orders over Brexit.
In an interview with the Times newspaper published on its website on Friday, Soames said Johnson, who wrote a biography of his hero Churchill, was not comparable to his celebrated grandfather.
“Boris Johnson is nothing like Winston Churchill. I don’t think anyone has called Boris a diplomat or statesman,” said Soames, who has been a Member of Parliament (MP) since 1983.
“Winston Churchill was like Winston Churchill because of his experiences in life. Boris Johnson’s experience in life is telling a lot of porkies (lies) about the European Union in Brussels and then becoming prime minister.”
Soames said he had shed tears after being one of 21 rebel Conservatives ousted from the party, having already announced he would not stand for parliament again at the next election.
He said Johnson had a “cunning plan” to get an election and was deliberately manipulating politicians, knowing he would not be able to strike a new withdrawal deal with the EU. He said the prime minister was “signed up to the Trump playbook — it’s ‘shock and awe’ until it all becomes normal.”
“He is engaged on this great Brexit obsession: get us out, deal or no deal, do or die,” Soames told the paper.
“That is not Winston Churchill. I think Churchill would have thought it extraordinary that we would have thought ourselves so successful, so powerful, so well thought of in the world that we could afford to give up this extraordinary relationship we have in this great European Union.”
UK’s Johnson is no Winston Churchill says wartime leader’s sacked grandson
UK’s Johnson is no Winston Churchill says wartime leader’s sacked grandson
- Nicholas Soames, 71, the son of Mary Soames, the youngest of Churchill’s five children, was expelled from Johnson’s party after defying party orders over Brexit
- Soames said Johnson, who wrote a biography of his hero Churchill, was not comparable to his celebrated grandfather
Ethiopia accuses Eritrea of arming rebels in escalating war of words
- The charge by Ethiopia’s federal police escalates a feud between Ethiopia and Eritrea
- The two countries fought a three-year border war that broke out in 1998
ADDIS ABABA: Ethiopian police said they had seized thousands of rounds of ammunition sent by Eritrea to rebels in Ethiopia’s Amhara region, an allegation Eritrea dismissed as a falsehood intended to justify starting a war.
The charge by Ethiopia’s federal police escalates a feud between Ethiopia and Eritrea, longstanding foes who reached a peace deal in 2018 that has since given way to renewed threats and acrimony.
The police said in a statement late on Wednesday they had seized 56,000 rounds of ammunition and arrested two suspects this week in the Amhara region, where Fano rebels have waged an insurgency since 2023.
“The preliminary investigation conducted on the two suspects who were caught red-handed has confirmed that the ammunition was sent by the Shabiya government,” the statement said, using a term for Eritrea’s ruling party.
Eritrea’s Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel told Reuters that Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s Prosperity Party (PP) was looking for a pretext to attack.
“The PP regime is floating false flags to justify the war that it has been itching to unleash for two long years,” he said.
In an interview earlier this week with state-run media, Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki said the Prosperity Party had declared war on his country. He said Eritrea did not want war, but added: “We know how to defend our nation.”
The two countries fought a three-year border war that broke out in 1998, five years after Eritrea won its independence from Ethiopia. They signed a historic agreement to normalize relations in 2018 that won Ethiopia’s Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize the following year. Eritrean troops then fought in support of Ethiopia’s army during a 2020-22 civil war in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region.
But relations soured after Asmara was frozen out of the peace deal that ended that conflict. Since then, Eritrea has bristled at repeated public declarations by Abiy that landlocked Ethiopia has a right to sea access — comments many in Eritrea, which lies on the Red Sea, view as an implicit threat of military action.
Abiy has said Ethiopia does not seek conflict with Eritrea and wants to address the issue of sea access through dialogue.
