UK distances itself from Biden saying Putin
‘cannot remain in power’
Nadhim Zahawi said it was for the Russian people to
decide Vladimir Putin’s future
Jessica Elgot
@jessicaelgot
Sun 27 Mar 2022
11.48 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/mar/27/nadhim-zahawi-biden-russia-putin
A UK
cabinet minister distanced the government from Joe Biden’s call that Russia’s
Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power” amid criticism that the comment could
bolster the Kremlin.
Though no
government figure has been overtly critical of the comments – unlike the French
president, Emmanuel Macron – Nadhim Zahawi, the education secretary, said it
was “for the Russian people to decide how they are governed” after the
unscripted remark from Biden at a speech in Poland on Saturday, which the White
House later said was not a call for regime change.
“I think
that’s up to the Russian people,” Zahawi told Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday. “The
Russian people, I think, are pretty fed up with what is happening in Ukraine,
this illegal invasion, the destruction of their own livelihoods, their economy
is collapsing around them and I think the Russian people will decide the fate
of Putin and his cronies.”
Boris
Johnson and the foreign secretary, Liz Truss, have promised further measures
this week to ease the humanitarian crisis caused by Russia’s invasion and to
continue the economic squeeze on Moscow.
On Monday,
the chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, Steve Barclay, is to write to public
sector bodies and local authorities to ask them to review any commercial connections
with Russian interests, the Guardian understands.
Royal Navy
ships have also delivered military supplies to Nato to bolster security in the
Baltic Sea, including bringing military vehicles and equipment to resupply the
UK-led Nato battlegroup in Estonia.
Biden’s
comments at a speech in Warsaw came as Russia fired missiles aimed at the
western Ukrainian city of Lviv, 40 miles from the Polish border. The city is
the most pro-western in the country and the base of many western journalists,
with strikes intended to send a clear signal to the White House.
In what
seemed to be a dramatic shift in US policy, Biden also appeared to urge those
around the Russian president to oust him from the Kremlin. “For God’s sake,
this man cannot remain in power,” Biden said. US officials later said that the
president had been talking about the need for Putin to lose power over
Ukrainian territory and in the wider region.
Zahawi
stopped short of saying Biden had been wrong to make the call. He said: “It’s
an illegal invasion of Ukraine and that must end, and I think that’s what the
president was talking about.”
Some have
voiced fears that the speech would bolster Putin domestically. Tobias Ellwood,
the chair of the Commons defence select committee, said it had been “unwise” to
make the remark, saying Putin would “spin this, dig in and fight harder”.
The former
Labour foreign secretary Margaret Beckett said she could understand what
prompted the call. “I’m sure that his staff and the people around him are right
to say America’s not calling for regime change, but equally I think many people
will sympathise with the sentiments that led him to say what he did.”
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