Former French ambassador brands Boris Johnson an 'inveterate liar'

Former French ambassador Sylvie Bermann brands Boris Johnson an ‘inveterate liar’ and slates Brexiteers for demanding gratitude for the ‘myth’ that Britain liberated Europe in the Second World War

• Sylvie Bermann said Mr Johnson is a man who uses ‘lies to embellish reality’
• She also took aim at hardline eurosceptics in a new book, Goodbye Britannia
• Said they ‘peddle the myth’ that Britain defeated the Nazis by itself 

France’s former ambassador to Britain has launched a scathing attack on Boris Johnson and Brexiteers, branding the Prime minister an ‘inveterate liar’.

Sylvie Bermann has also taken aim at hardline eurosceptics for ‘peddling the myth’ that  Britain liberated Europe from Nazi rule in the Second World War all by itself.

In a new book, Ms Bermann, who was ambassador from 2014 to 2017, saved her most savage language for Mr Johnson, saying he is a man who uses ‘lies to embellish reality, as a game and as instrument of power. The ends justify the means. He has no rules.’ 

She also claimed Mr Johnson would be tempted to ‘hide the bill for Brexit under the Covid carpet’. 

Writing in Goodbye Britainnia she also attacks the ‘partisans of Brexit’ who do not allow millions of war dead in other allied countries like Russia to ‘disturb the discourse of the Brexiters who peddle the myth that the UK liberated Europe alone and needs no one’.

While France does owe Britain for its help during the war, she added: ‘It is right to remember that they were not alone and you cannot live with a history that stopped in June 1944’. 

Downing Street declined to respond to the comments about Mr Johnson today. 

In a new book, Ms Bermann, who was ambassador from 2014 to 2017, saved her most savage language for Mr Johnson, saying he is a man who uses ‘lies to embellish reality, as a game and as instrument of power. The ends justify the means. He has no rules.’

She also claimed Mr Johnson (pictured together in 2016)  would be tempted to ‘hide the bill for Brexit under the Covid carpet’.

Speaking at an event at the Rusi think tank last night, Ms Berman defended calling Mr Johnson a liar. 

“He would not object to being called that. He knows he is a liar. He has always played with that. He was fired from his first post for that reason,’ she said, according to the Guardian.

Ms Berman left her UK post in 2017 to become the French ambassador to Russia. She was previously her nation’s envoy to China. 

Her attack came as a former senior Tory minister claimed that the party is no longer a place for pro-Europeans. 

Ex-home secretary Amber Rudd, a Remain supporter, said that those hoping to be selected as a candidate for MP had to show ‘real Brexit enthusiasm’.

She resigned the Conservative whip after Boris Johnson sacked 21 of her colleagues who tried to stop a no-deal Brexit. She did not stand again as an MP in 2019.

She said on ITV yesterday: ‘The Conservative Party used to be a place where you could have pro and anti-Europeans, not always in harmony, but it was a home for both. Now there is no place for pro-European Conservatives.

‘That’s a loss because I think there’s a legitimate Conservative position which is pro-European, not trying to get back into the EU, but fundamentally pro-European. Those people are not going to be part of the MP selection process in the future.’  

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