Burnham Tells Zelensky Britain’s Support “Will Not Change”
Volodymyr Zelensky was met in Downing Street by a ceremonial guard — which Number 10 says it can find no record of for a foreign leader there — after an audience with the King. “We are behind you and that will not change,” the prime minister said, announcing faster delivery of British-made air defences. Mr Zelensky said he would raise Starlink and intelligence.
The ceremony did the talking that the prime minister would not. At PMQs Sir Ed Davey invited him to call the Russian diesel deal “yet another shameful Trump betrayal”; Mr Burnham declined, saying his role was to “try and repair bridges so that the support comes back”. That is a deliberate bet that London is more useful as a broker than a critic, made after the American president said it was “time for Ukraine to get a new president”. Mr Zelensky said there had been “some difficulties” and “a lot of different surprises on which you can’t count”, and declined to say whether Washington had stopped sharing intelligence. Further military and financial packages are promised “in the coming weeks”.