Joe Biden delivers astonishing rebuke to Boris Johnson accusing UK of ‘inflaming tensions’

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Joe Biden issued a stern rebuke to Boris Johnson for ‘inflaming tensions’ in Northern Ireland and threatening the peace process – over Britain’s stance with the EU over the ‘sausage war’. 

The US President used his diplomats to express ‘great concern’ over the conflict and ‘strongly urged’ Britain to ‘stay cool’ and reach an agreement, even if that meant making ‘unpopular compromises’.

He even seemed to threaten the possibility of a future trade deal with the United States, claiming that Britain accepting demands to stick to EU agricultural rules would mean the issue would not ‘negatively affect the chances’ of coming to a free trade deal with Britain. 

Mr Biden has begun his first foreign trip as president, consisting of eight days in Europe where he will meet Boris Johnson and his new wife Carrie, the rest of the G7 leaders, The Queen, NATO officials and Russian Premier Vladimir Putin on June 16 in Geneva.

The President and his wife Jill left Washington on Wednesday morning and landed at Royal Air Force Mildenhall to address US Air Force personnel stationed in Britain. At the start of his speech he told the standing troops to sit by saying ‘at ease’, then said: ‘I keep forgetting I am president’.

During his address, he said he would be meeting with Mr Putin to ‘let him know what I want him to know’; told the crowd that ‘global warming’ is the biggest threat to the US; teared up as he paid tribute to his late veteran son Beau; and boasted that ‘America is back’.

When Mr Biden meets the Prime Minister today at St Michael’s Mount, a 17th-century castle on an island just off the coast of Cornwall, he is tipped to set up a new ‘Atlantic Charter’ modelled on the post-Second World War pact made by FDR and Winston Churchill, and will work to open up travel between the US and UK ‘as soon as possible’. 

But the US President has ordered his officials to issue a rare diplomatic rebuke to the British Government for its continued opposition to checks at Northern Irish ports.

Yael Lempert, charge d’affaires at the US Embassy in London, told Brexit Minister Lord Frost the UK’s stance was imperilling the peace process. She had been ordered to issue the diplomatic rebuke, known as a demarche, a step rarely taken between allies, The Times said.

They are often issued alongside a summons for the country’s ambassador to attend the Foreign Office.

Government minutes from June 3 reveal Lord Frost was told of President Biden’s ‘great concern’ in a tense encounter in which Ms Lempert is said to have ‘slowly and gravely read her instructions aloud’.  

She is said to have implied the UK had been ‘inflaming the rhetoric’ and asked if the Government would ‘keep it cool’. She also warned the dispute between Britain and the EU was ‘commanding the attention’ of Mr Biden ahead of his meeting with the PM today.

The memo said the US ‘strongly urged’ Britain to come to a ‘negotiated settlement’ even if it meant ‘unpopular compromises’.

But Ms Lempert, who is America’s most senior diplomat in Britain, said that if the UK could accept demands to follow EU rules on agricultural standards, Mr Biden would ensure the matter ‘wouldn’t negatively affect the chances of reaching a US/UK free trade deal.’

The rebuke came as crunch talks between Britain and Brussels over sausage imports failed to make a breakthrough. European Commission vice-president Maros Sefcovic threatened to retaliate if the UK takes unilateral action to continue the flow of British-produced chilled meats to Northern Ireland.

A ban affecting goods including burgers and chicken nuggets is due to come into force at the end of this month when a grace period expires.

Mr Sefcovic warned that the EU’s patience with the UK over its implementation of post-Brexit border rules in the Northen Ireland Protocol governing trade was ‘wearing very, very thin’.

Speaking at a press conference in London after three-and-a-half hours of talks with Lord Frost, he claimed Brussels had shown ‘enormous patience’ with Britain.Mr Sefcovic said relations with the UK were ‘at a crossroads’ – and warned that Brussels was ready to launch retaliatory action if Mr Johnson extends the grace period.

‘Of course, as you would understand, the fact that I mentioned that we are at a crossroads means that our patience really is wearing very, very thin, and therefore we have to assess all options we have at our disposal,’ he added.

‘I was talking about the legal action, I was talking about arbitration, and of course I’m talking about the cross-retaliation.’

Mr Sefcovic said the EU ‘will not be shy’ in launching retaliation. He declined to set out the exact measures Brussels was willing to take, but suggested it could include retaliatory tariffs and quotas on British exports or ‘non-co-operation’ in areas like financial services.

The PM had said that his Brexit deal would not require any additional checks on goods traded between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. But Mr Sefcovic said proper implementation of the deal would require ‘many checks’.

In a calculated barb, he suggested ministers may not have fully understood the consequences of the deal they were signing. ‘When the agreement was being negotiated it might be that our British partners could not fully estimate the consequences of the Brexit they had chosen – what it would mean to leave the single market and customs union, how complex it would be for business and government,’ he said.

Mr Sefcovic conceded that British meat products had been produced to the same standards as those in the EU for decades. But he said there was ‘no guarantee’ this would continue and claimed the import of sausages from the UK could cause ‘public health’ problems in the future. He said the EU had offered a deal which would solve ’80 per cent of the problems’. This would involve the UK agreeing to align with EU standards on the relevant products – an idea the PM has ruled out. Mr Sefcovic said this could be on a ‘temporary’ basis, with the UK allowed to renegotiate if it strikes a major trade deal with the US.

Lord Frost insisted there is still time to reach an agreement before the current ‘grace period’ for chilled meats ends, but said the UK will consider ‘all options’ if it proves impossible.

A senior source later confirmed that includes the option of extending the grace period unilaterally. 

‘The PM has been pretty clear that he can’t see a reason why we shouldn’t be able to sell the British banger in Northern Ireland. The biosecurity risk is zero.’ 

EU officials say without an agreement by July 1, there should be no fresh meat that moves from the British mainland to the province. 

At their arrival on Wednesday night, Joe and Jill Biden received a warm welcome at the base, garnering several rounds of applause. They spoke outdoors as the sun set behind them. Both Bidens wore face masks but took them off to speak. 

President Biden also mentioned his late son Beau, a major in the Delaware Army National Guard. He teared up as he thanked military personnel the Royal Air Force Mildenhall for their service.

‘I wish my major was here to thank you as well,’ he said referencing his late son, who died of brain cancer in 2015.  ‘You’re the best of our country,’ he added.

He also outlined the goals of his trip and the message he wanted to give to world:  ‘The United States is back and the democracies of the world are standing together to face the toughest challenges.’

Biden said during his meetings with fellow leaders, he would focus on COVID, climate change, and on protecting themselves from ‘the growing threat of ransomware attacks…[and] the autocrats who are letting it happen.’

After his G7 meeting, Biden will meet in Brussels with NATO and EU leaders, where the Russian and Chinese threats will top the agenda.  

After his remarks, Biden left the stage to shake hands with service members. 

Before the president spoke, Jill Biden admonished him to focus when she addressed the troops.

‘Joe pay attention,’ the first lady told the president. 

She had just told the service members to sit down. President Biden, standing behind her, turned around to see the troops positioned behind the stage.

That was when the first lady asked chided him to watch her as she addressed Air Force personnel at Royal Air Force Mildenhall.

In her brief remarks, the first lady thanked the troops for their service and touted her Joining Forces initiative – a group she formed with then-first lady Michelle Obama to support families of American troops. 

‘I hope that you know how special you are. And we are so grateful for your and your family’s service,’ she said. 

Biden and his wife Jill, a university professor, touched down at RAF Mildenhall, Suffolk in Air Force One just after 7.30pm, kicking off the president’s eight-day trip to Europe.

The UK stop also includes face-to-face meetings with the Queen and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. 

After speaking to troops, the Bidens head to Carbis Bay near St Ives, where the leaders of Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and Canada will gather for three days to discuss the pandemic and climate change among other issues. 

Biden is scheduled to meet with Johnson for face-to-face talks Thursday – the first time the two men will have met in person – before the G7 Summit formally gets underway on Friday. 

When the summit ends on Sunday, the President and First Lady will meet the Queen at Windsor Castle.

Biden will then depart for Brussels where he will attend a NATO summit and a joint US-EU summit before then heading to Geneva for a bilateral showdown with Putin. 

In an op-ed for the Washington Post, Biden said that the trip is about ‘realising America’s renewed commitment to our allies and partners’ as he attempts to build bridges with Britain and the EU after some leaders including German Chancellor Angela Merkel clashed with his predecessor Donald Trump. 

The Republican president engaged in a bitter trade row with the EU and slammed NATO members for failing to spend more on defense – sparking fears that he would pull the US out of the military alliance and embolden Russian activity in Ukraine and eastern Europe.

Trump also formally withdrew the US from the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris Agreement – both negotiated by Barack Obama. One of Biden’s first acts as President was to rejoin the climate accord and reopen nuclear talks with the Iranian government, as he sought to reverse the actions of the previous administration. 

The White House has said that Biden will meet with Johnson to ‘affirm the special relationship between our nations’ – a term which the prime minister reportedly dislikes because it is ‘too needy’. 

Whitehall is understood to have viewed the President’s decision to make the UK his first overseas destination as a major diplomatic victory for Johnson. 

The Prime Minister has lavished praised on Biden since he won power in the election last year, in the hope of striking a new free trade deal with the US. 

However, there are concerns that he and the President may not get along, after Democratic sources previously questioned whether Johnson was an ‘ally’.

Johnson had sought close relations with Trump, causing Biden to call him a ‘physical and emotional clone’ of the controversial Republican president. 

Johnson faced fierce domestic criticism over his relationship with Trump, but has defended the ties and has insisted that prime ministers should always have the ‘best possible’ ties with sitting US presidents.

There has also been speculation Johnson and Biden could struggle to work together because of the Prime Minister’s past criticism of Barack Obama, in whose administration Biden served as vice president. 

Biden is also expected to put pressure on the UK not to renege on the Northern Ireland Brexit Protocol in a bid to preserve the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. US concerns about the province’s trade status could even derail efforts to strike an Anglo-US trade deal.  

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told the BBC: ‘President Biden believes and has said that the Northern Ireland Protocol, as part of the agreement between the UK and the European Union, is critical to ensuring that the spirit, promise and future of the Good Friday Agreement is protected.

‘That being said, of course the UK and EU need to work out the specifics and the modalities on that, need to find some way to proceed that works both for the EU and the UK. But whatever way they find to proceed must, at its core, fundamentally protect the gains of the Good Friday Agreement and not imperil that.

‘And that is the message that President Biden will send when he is in Cornwall.’ 

However, there were positive signs in March of the ‘special relationship’ warming up after Biden’s climate envoy John Kerry visited London for talks with Johnson. The positive trend continued in May when US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington has ‘no closer partner’ than the UK. 

Biden will join others from the G7 group of leading economies in Carbis Bay on Friday, where Devon and Cornwall Police are expecting climate protests.

Johnson plans to use the summit to urge the members – also including Canada, Japan, France, Germany and Italy – to ‘defeat’ Covid-19 by helping to vaccinate the world by the end of next year.  

The White House said in April when it confirmed the trip to Europe that Biden will ‘highlight his commitment to restoring our alliances, revitalizing the Transatlantic relationship, and working in close cooperation with our allies and multilateral partners to address global challenges and better secure America’s interests’.  

During an official visit to the UK, Blinken said that the ‘special relationship’ is ‘enduring’, ‘effective’ and ‘dynamic’ as well as being ‘close to the hearts of the American people’. 

Speaking at a press conference in Downing Street alongside Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, Blinken said: ‘It is also the 75th anniversary of Winston Churchill’s famous speech at Westminster College in Missouri where he described the Special Relationship between the United Kingdom and the United States and how vital it is for our two countries and many others around the world.

‘Three quarters of a century later, that Special Relationship is enduring, it is effective, it is dynamic and it is close to the hearts of the American people. The United States has no closer ally, no closer partner, than the United Kingdom and I am very glad for the chance to say that again here today.’  

The President’s security team for the Summit is reportedly so vast they will have to stay in more than 50 hired luxury camper vans because there is not enough accommodation.

The recreational vehicles have been delivered to St Mawgan airbase near Newquay, 20 miles from where the meeting of leaders takes place in the tiny Cornish resort of Carbis Bay at the weekend.

A 400-strong contingent of Secret Service agents and support staff will be at the summit, but with thousands of holidaymakers already in the area, almost every hotel and B&B in a 30-mile radius of the summit has been booked.

Meanwhile, video footage showed two Sea King and three V-22 Osprey helicopters soaring above Cornwall and Devon as they practiced the route the President will take from the airbase to Tregenna Castle Resort, St Ives, after Air Force One lands at RAF Mildenhall and then Newquay airport on Wednesday. 

Some 1,000 police will be staying on a cruise liner docked in Falmouth harbour and others will stay in RVs currently parked up at the RAF airbase near Newquay. 

It comes after a long line of caravans clogged up the A30 on Monday as holidaymakers made their way to the southern-most point of England. One photograph shared on social media showed heavy traffic that had been ‘crawling’ for around 20 minutes near the Devon-Cornwall border.   

Meanwhile for the summit, some 30 vehicles have been leased from a Somerset company called Empire RV, which usually supplies luxury vehicles for film shoots and Grand Prix events.

The US camper vans are so large that the company warns many can only be driven by one of their experienced staff and are not available for self-drive hire. The most luxurious ones – some the size of an articulated lorry – can sleep up to eight people and come equipped with satellite TV and other comforts.

The RV sare expected to be driven to the Tregenna Hotel in Carbis Bay where the president is due to stay during the three-day conference. The castle boasts 98 bedrooms and is the grandest hotel in the county, featuring a 72-acre estate and an 18-hole golf course.

The US motor homes have been rented for £2,500 each for a week by the US Embassy in London and include the 45ft long former RV used by Jensen Button when he was racing in Formula 1.  

A spokesman for Bristol based Empire RV said they had set up a mini village at the St Mawgan airbase. 

A helicopter, which is dubbed Marine One when the US president is onboard, practised landing on the golf course at the Tregenna Castle Resort – where President Biden and the other leaders will stay – on Monday. 

Pilots familiarising the route they will take after Air Force One lands at Newquay Airport later this week have taken to the skies above Cornwall in recent days.  Three US Marine Osprey aircraft have been seen over St Michael Mount and the Carbis Bay area.

The aircrafts’ purpose is to fly White House staff during the President’s trips abroad. They also transport Secret Service agents that follow Marine One in case the helicopter goes down.   

Ospreys were seen over Haldon Hills near Exeter at 8pm on Monday, where it is thought they may have just left Exeter Airport. By 8.40pm the aircraft were spotted landing at Tregenna Castle Resort. 

The helicopters were seen landing at Carlyon Bay, St Austell, at 9.45pm, before descending onto Tregenna Castle Resort at 10.15pm.    The aircraft were brought to the UK on the US Air Force’s Boeing C-17 Globemaster III. 

They were offloaded at the Royal Navy airbase Culdrose, near Helston, on Sunday. The impressive US-military aircraft flew high over the steep sand dunes of Hayle beach, St Ives, at around 9.30pm on Monday. 

Carrie’s first official duties as Mrs Johnson! Newlywed will meet First Lady Jill Biden for tea and tour St. Michael’s Mount in Cornwall ahead of the G7 summit

America’s First Lady will meet with newlywed Carrie Symonds during her trip to the UK this week for the G7 summit, the White House has announced. 

In a statement released this afternoon, it was confirmed that President Joe Biden’s wife Jill, 70, will enjoy a visit with the new Mrs Johnson, 33, over tea on Thursday.

Jill, a university professor, and Carrie, a former Tory aide, will then tour St. Michael’s Mount off the coast of Cornwall, where the G7 summit is being held on Friday.

Last week, Buckingham Palace announced that the First Lady and her husband President Biden will also meet with the Queen at Windosr Castle on June 13.

‘The President and First Lady will meet with The Right Honorable Boris Johnson, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and Mrs Carrie Johnson,’ the statement from the First Lady’s office read.

‘The First Lady and Mrs Johnson will meet separately over tea and then tour St. Michael’s Mount off the coast of Cornwall.’

This weekend, when Mrs Johnson joins her new husband Boris at the G7 Summit, will be their first major engagement as a married couple.

Carrie will be in charge of all the leaders’ spouses, including France’s First Lady Brigitte Macron, 68, Joachim Sauer, 72, husband of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Sophie Gregoire Trudeau, 46, wife of Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau.  

Boris and Carrie married in a private Catholic ceremony at Westminster Cathedral on May 29, with a small group of family and friends present. 

They proceeded with a small reception in the Downing Street garden, where an official photograph of the bride and groom was taken.

The couple have already sent save-the-date cards for a wider celebration on July 30 next year. The couple’s one-year-old son Wilfred attended the small wedding in the cathedral where he had previously been baptised.

The bride wore a rented long lace gown and a floral headband. She has taken the Prime Minister’s surname and is now known as Mrs Johnson.

It is understood Mrs Johnson was unhappy that an unofficial snap, presumed to have been taken by a guest, circulated on social media.  Downing Street declined to comment on the timing of the wedding.

Meanwhile, President Biden is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Boris for face-to-face talks tomorrow – the first time the two men will have met in person – before the summit formally gets underway on Friday. 

When the summit ends on Sunday, the President and First Lady will meet the Queen at Windsor Castle.

Mr Biden will then depart for Brussels where he will attend a NATO summit and a joint US-EU summit before then heading to Geneva in Switzerland for a bilateral showdown with Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

In an article for the Washington Post, Mr Biden announced that the trip is about ‘realising America’s renewed commitment to our allies and partners’ as he attempts to mend relations with Britain and the EU.

His predecessor Donald Trump engaged in a bitter trade row with the EU and slammed NATO members for failing to spend more on defence – sparking fears that he would pull the US out of the alliance.

The Republican president also angered the international community after he formally withdrew the US from the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris Agreement – both negotiated by Barack Obama. One of Mr Biden’s first acts as President was to rejoin the climate accord and reopen nuclear talks with the Islamic Republic. 

Mr Biden also said that he would meet with Mr Johnson to ‘affirm the special relationship between our nations’ – a term which the British premier reportedly told the President that he hates because it is ‘too needy’.