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LONDON — The late Queen Elizabeth II was asked to step in and stop Russian-British media tycoon Evgeny Lebedev getting a place in the House of Lords, it has been reported.
The Guardian — citing forthcoming documentary “Boris, the Lords & the Russian Spy: Dispatches” — said Monday that British government officials contacted Buckingham Palace in July 2020 to ask whether the monarch would block a peerage for Lebedev, the son of oligarch and former KGB officer Alexander Lebedev.
The place in the U.K.’s upper chamber — which was ultimately waived through — had been recommended by then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who drew political heat for the move amid wider concerns about Russian influence on British politics.
Alexander Lebedev and his son bought newspaper titles the Evening Standard and the Independent more than a decade ago. The elder Lebedev was sanctioned by Canada last year in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The queen is constitutionally entitled to halt an appointment to the U.K.’s unelected upper chamber, but the palace reportedly refused the 2020 request amid concern about involving the late monarch in a political controversy.
David Clark, a Labour peer and member of the House of Lords Appointments Commission (Holac) which vets peerages, told the Guardian that government officials “were really concerned about” the appointment, and believed it was “a major, major mistake.”
A spokesperson for Johnson told the paper that the ex-prime minister remained “fully supportive of Lord Lebedev’s appointment.”
They added: “As the government has previously confirmed, Holac and security advice was not overruled. The proper process was followed. As this program makes clear, there were no concerns about Lord Lebedev.
“Lord Lebedev is a British citizen. He has invested in British journalism and has extensively criticized the Russian regime. It is not right to judge people on the basis of their country of birth or the sound of their surname. This is a tiresome and xenophobic campaign.”
A spokesperson for Evgeny Lebedev told the Channel 4 documentary team: “He is familiar with the security advice and understands no such attempt was made by the security services to persuade the PM to withdraw the nomination.”
