Yvette Cooper has used an urgent question in the Commons to ask if Alexander Lebedev sought to arrange a private phone call between Boris Johnson and the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, during a weekend party in April 2018.
A day after Johnson admitted for the first time that he had met Lebedev, a former KGB agent, the shadow home secretary told the Commons there were further questions raised by the trip to the party at an Italian palazzo owned by Lebedev’s son.
“There are also rumours that Alexander Lebedev was trying to arrange a phone call from the meeting with the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, is that true? Did that phone call happen?” Cooper asked from the dispatch box.
In reply, Vicky Ford, a junior Foreign Office minister, said: “I take national security issues seriously,” but she failed to address the question substantively. She said ministers had introduced “world-leading sanctions packages” since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. …
Ever the conservative way! When asked a direct question, reply with many words that do not answer the question! rethugs have constantly done that at least since I was a kid.