In his memoirs, Boris Johnson particularly criticizes Emmanuel Macron

Brexit, English accent: former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson makes fun of Emmanuel Macron and settles scores with the French president whom he describes in particular as “real nuisance”according to extracts from his memoirs published this Monday, September 30 in the Daily Mail. The thunderous former British Conservative leader publishes on October 10 “Unleashed”in which he recounts his experience in politics, notably his time at Downing Street from 2019 to 2022, marked by negotiations with the European Union on Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Although Macron was personally charming, and although we often agreed on important issues, he really meant what he said when he said the UK should be punished” for Brexit, writes Boris Johnson. He describes at length his exchanges with European leaders such as former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron, whose accent he mocks when he speaks English. “On certain subjects, I fear I suspected him of being a real nuisance”he says about the latter.

Undermining one of the most important issues of Brexit

He criticizes Emmanuel Macron in particular for his attitude in the thorny issue of migrants who illegally cross the Channel to reach the United Kingdom from France, a very sensitive subject on the British side. “It seemed to me at least possible that he used the problem” et “discreetly allowed a sufficiently large number of migrants to cross” the Channel “to drive the British people crazy, and undermine one of the most important issues of Brexit, which was to regain control of our borders”writes Boris Johnson.

The former prime minister still evokes the anger of the French president when the British AstraZeneca developed one of the first vaccines against Covid-19, and congratulates himself on having caused France to suffer a setback by concluding with the States -United and Australia a defense alliance which derailed a multi-billion euro agreement between Paris and Canberra. An alliance “which was really going to be an uppercut for the French”writes Johnson. Since leaving Downing Street in the summer of 2022, Boris Johnson has notably become a columnist for the tabloid The Daily Mailwhile being paid tens of thousands of euros for conferences.