UK’s Johnson vows to help Ukraine more with defensive weapons

LONDON

The UK with its allies “will do more with defensive weapons to help our Ukrainian friends” against “pitiless Russian bombardments,” the British prime minister said on Friday.

Addressing the Scottish Conservatives conference in Aberdeen, Scotland, Boris Johnson said that “we will do more to tighten the vice around (Russian President Vladimir) Putin's economy and with every day that the slaughter the inhuman behaviour of Putin's War Machine continues, I think that the resolve of the world to do more is growing.”

“And I am more than ever convinced that Putin will fail,” Johnson said.

He said: “He (Putin) will fail in his catastrophic venture in Ukraine because he fatally underestimated the heroism and the resolve of the Ukrainians to fight, he underestimated Western unity and among other things, by the way, he underestimated the passionate commitment of the people of this country to help.”

Underlining that 147,000 people and families across the UK applied through a scheme to host Ukrainians who are fleeing their country, the prime minister said: “Aberdeenshire has the highest number so far.”

Johnson said that “but there is more we can do now and there's one crucial way that we can all begin to help the world to stand up to Putin.”

“And that is to wean ourselves off dependence on his oil and gas and in that great national effort.”

He explained that the government has allocated £39 million ($51.4 million) in projects to benefit from solar and nuclear power, as well as hydrogen.

Johnson said: “Together our country, the UK, is leading the world in standing up to the hydrocarbon drug pushing bully of the Kremlin.”

“And together we're going to wean ourselves off that thinking to Russian hydrocarbons and together we are a force for good in the world.”

Also speaking about the second independence bid from the Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who has pledged a referendum by the end of 2023, Johnson said “this is not the time” to have another referendum.

“This is not the time for yet more delectable disputations about the Constitution when our European continent is being ravaged by the most vicious war since 1945,” he said.