Boris Johnson is treating victims of Russian aggression like a human shield to protect him from partygate – iNews

Boris Johnson has discovered an interest in Ukraine. Not just Ukraine, of course hes suddenly interested in all sorts of things to which hes paid precious little attention over the last couple of years, including levelling up, freeports and Jimmy Savile. Anything to get him out of the party scandal.

This week hes flown to Kyiv, where Ukrainians are facing tens of thousands of Russian troops massing on their border, and said all the right things. Vladimir Putin is trying to redraw the security map of Europe. He is threatening a sovereign democratic state. He is a force of rampant nihilism dedicated to undermining the post-war world order. All quite right. It was even backed up by an announcement that Britain would send another 900 troops to Estonia and introduce individual-specific sanctioning powers.

Its not the first time Johnson has discovered his interest in foreign policy. In actual fact, its the second. In June 2018, he arranged a trip to the Afghan capital of Kabul which allowed him to escape a Commons vote on Heathrow airport expansion, which he had once promised to lie down in front of bulldozers to prevent. That trip, seemingly taken for self-interested and cowardly reasons, was about as much interest as hed ever shown in foreign affairs while acting as Foreign Secretary.

The only other notable accomplishments he had in the post involved comparing a former French president to an officer in a Second World War prison camp, joking about Libyan corpses, reciting a colonial era Kipling poem in a Burmese temple, and inadvertently supporting the Iranian case against dual-British national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

That was his record: indifference, negligence, imperial-tinged condescension and a complete inability to dedicate himself to the long, slow, detailed work required of one of the most senior positions in British government.

By the time he was Prime Minister that approach had metastasised across the entire government. Kabul fell to the Taliban in August last year. Foreign secretary Dominic Raab was enjoying the sun on holiday when it happened. We learned last week that Johnsons chief of staff, Dan Rosenfield, spent the day at the Cricket at Lords days beforehand. A report in the Sunday Times claimed that top secret Strap papers were left lying around Johnsons red box when his wife had guests over.

That negligence has defined the entirety of the foreign affairs brief and Russia is a case in point. Weve known for years now what needs to be done to challenge Putin. We need to hit him in the wallet. But security experts say it is almost impossible to get Johnson to pay attention to it.

London is a global laundering capital for dirty money. It does this in two ways. First, by investment allowing people to dump ill-gotten gains in UK assests without sufficient checks as to where it came from. And second, by services through providing the lawyers, accountants and others who enable the transactions.

This is the system which Putin used to establish himself in the UK. As the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee said four years ago: President Putin and his allies have been able to continue business as usual by hiding and laundering their corrupt assets in London. These assets, on which the Kremlin can call at any time, both directly and indirectly support President Putins campaign to subvert the international rules-based system.

Two years ago, The Intelligence and Security Committee told parliament that Russian oligarchs were using the UKs investor visa scheme and light-tough regulatory framework to establish a wealth-drenched eco-system of Kremlin lobbying. They used their cash to create a cottage industry of PR firms, charities, political groups and cultural institutions which helped launder the Kremlins reputation. Members of the Russian elite with close links to Putin engaged in donations to political parties, the committee said.

Kremlin-watchers have been pushing for years for powers which would clear up the Russian use of London as a moral and financial laundering centre. They want Companies House to be reformed so that it is more than a glorified library and instead becomes a statutory agency with the powers to verify the information provided to it. They want full transparency of those buying property. And they want powers to freeze, seize and return assets, alongside individual sanctions.

One potential mechanism for that was the economic crime bill. Its been ready to go for years, but the Government failed to do anything with it. Last week, the minister for counter fraud, Lord Agnew, quit his job with a blistering broadside against the Government. Last week, he wrote in his resignation letter, a foolish decision was made to kill off the prospect of an economic crime bill in the third session.

That provoked an outcry from MPs across the political divide which, together with the desperate scramble to get away from partygate, seems to have finally triggered Johnsons newfound interest in Ukraine.

But its not enough to half-heartedly pursue a programme which has been gathering dust in order to get out of domestic troubles. Putin is a deadly, aggressive opponent. He requires a sustained and robust legislative response which hits him where hes vulnerable. Instead we get this: laziness, lack of interest, and self-interested public relations exercises.

Johnson has proved himself singularly incapable of the task in front of us. He does not have the moral purpose, seriousness of mind, diligence of work ethic or basic sense of national responsibility.

That alone would be damning enough. But now were treated to the grotesque spectacle of watching him pretend to care about Ukraine so that he can escape from the humiliations he is facing at home. He is treating the victims of Russia aggression like a human shield, to defend himself against the consequences of his own actions.

They deserve better. And so do we, for that matter.

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Boris Johnson is treating victims of Russian aggression like a human shield to protect him from partygate - iNews