LONDON, March 25. /TASS/. London's attempts to implement the concept of ‘Global Britain’ after leaving the European Union have failed, Russian Ambassador to the UK Andrey Kelin told TASS.
"After Brexit, <…> the concept of Global Britain appeared," the ambassador recalled. He explained that London saw the concept in such a way that the country "would go around the world, making new arrangements, improving the trade base, benefiting from it and prospering."
"All that has failed. The UK has neither the strength nor the capability. Neither economic nor political. And now another concept has been adopted: the need to establish long-term relations with promising medium-sized countries. [Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs] James Cleverly and the government are working in this direction, but in small steps," Kelin noted.
According to the diplomat’s observations, ordinary British citizens are more concerned about the state of the country's economy. "I do not notice that the population here is interested in foreign policy issues in a broad sense. This is the concern of a fairly limited circle of the establishment. The population is more interested in purely economic demands, in straightening the economy, raising wages. I don't see that they correlate military expenditures and aid to Ukraine with the fact that there is a permanent failure in terms of the economy. In February, inflation again turned out to be double-digit (10.4% - TASS), contrary to what was promised and forecasted by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. So the situation, which has been deteriorating during all the last years of the Conservative Party's rule, is not getting any better," Kelin pointed out. The Tories have been in power in the UK since 2010.