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Number 10 has hit back at Russia’s “completely farcical” claim that the UK is the “main instigator” of global conflict across the world.
Moscow’s bizarre allegation comes amid rising global tensions over the threat posed by Vladimir Putin as the war with Ukraine continues.
Keir Starmer is stepping up his efforts to come up with a peace plan to present to Donald Trump alongside Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy and French leader Emmanuel Macron.
The prime minister is also pulling together a “coalition of the willing” of countries to police any ceasefire and ensure Russia does not attack its neighbour again.
But in a statement issued on Monday, a Russian spy agency, the SVR, said: “As we can see, London today, just as it did on the eve of both world wars of the last century, acts as the main ‘instigator’ of the global conflict.
“At the same time, the British themselves, obviously, are again counting on sitting it out on their island.
“It is time to expose them and send a clear signal to the treacherous Albion and its elites: you will not succeed.”
A spokesman for Starmer slammed the statement when speaking to reporters.
He said: “It’s completely farcical and there is just one country that has launched an unjustified invasion of a sovereign country, that has abducted around 19,000 children and continues to target critical national infrastructure, to starve innocent children and the elderly of heat and light, and one country sending thousands of its own sons and daughters to their deaths in pursuit of its imperialist ideology.”
The Liberal Democrats’ foreign affairs spokesperson Calum Miller also hit out at the comments from Moscow, telling HuffPost UK: “Putin’s attempts to blame the UK for the war in Ukraine show just how extreme the Kremlin’s misinformation campaign has become. There is only one nation at fault in this conflict: Russia.
“If the Russian leader’s effort to rewrite history was not so sinister, it would be laughable. In the last week, we have now seen both JD Vance and Putin disrespect the courageous British soldiers who gave up their lives on foreign soil in defence of democracy.”
Meanwhile, the government has said spying accusations made by Russia against two British diplomats are “baseless and malicious”.
The pair – a diplomat and the spouse of another – have been accused of engaging in intelligence activity under the cover of the UK embassy in Moscow.
They have been ordered to leave the country within two weeks, the Russian news agency Tass said.
The Foreign Office said: “This is not the first time that Russia has made malicious and baseless accusations against our staff.”
It is the latest in a series of tit-for-tat expulsions involving the UK’s embassy in Moscow and the Russian mission in London.
In February the Foreign Office stripped a Russian diplomat of their accreditation, with David Lammy saying the the UK will be “unapologetic” in standing up to Putin.
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