Boris’s olive branch ahead of White House summit

He goes on US TV to back Afghan decision before meeting tonight

BORIS Johnson was today heading for the White House for talks with President Joe Biden to reinforce the special relationship as he seeks to strike breakthrough deals on climate change and trade with the US.

Ahead of the face-to-face meeting the Prime Minister took to America’s airwaves, telling NBC’s Today Show that he backed Mr Biden’s decision to pull US troops out of Afghanistan, even if he believed it could have been handled “differently”.

“America has been there for 20 years,” Mr Johnson told NBC. “It’s a respectable argument to say enough is enough. You can’t endlessly sub-contract the government of your country to other people.” Asked if he agreed with Mr Biden’s move to pull out even though it led to a scramble to evacuate British citizens and Afghan nationals, he added: “I mean, could we have done it a bit differently? Maybe.”

Despite recent tensions over Afghanistan, the Prime Minister is desperate to shore up relations with the UK’s closest ally ahead of the crunch COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in November where he needs US support to hit the target to raise $100 billion annually for poorer nations to reduce carbon emissions.

Before the meeting, his first trip to the White House since he became Prime Minister in 2019, Mr Johnson said the relationship with the US was as “good as it has been for decades”, and joked that he and Mr Biden shared a passion for trains. This was underlined by the US announcement yesterday lifting stringent travel restrictions for UK nationals who are double vaccinated from November.

There are also signals from Washington that Mr Biden was today preparing to use a speech to the UN General Assembly in New York to commit more US money to the international climate fund championed by Mr Johnson.

But Mr Johnson admitted that making progress on a UK-US trade deal was less likely with Mr Biden focused on handling

Joe has a lot of fish to fry, but I want a good trade deal that really works for the UK rather than a quick deal

America’s recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic... a blow to the UK’s postBrexit global trading ambitions.

“The reality is that Joe has a lot of fish to fry,” Mr Johnson said before arriving in New York for the White House talks and the UN summit. “We want to do it, but what we want is a good FTA [free trade agreement], a great FTA. And I have quite a lot of experience of American negotiations, and they are pretty ruthless, the American negotiators. I would much rather get a deal that really works for the UK than get a quick deal.”

The pair were also likely to discuss the fallout from the controversial new defence alliance to help Australia develop and build eight nuclear-powered submarines.

The agreement has sparked an angry backlash from France after the Australians cancelled a separate contract with Paris to deliver 12 conventional submarines. France’s European affairs minister Clement Beaune said today that his government was exploring “all options”“Our relations are very difficult,” Mr Beaune said ahead of a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels. “We cannot act as if nothing happened. We need to look into all options.”

In a further sign of the diplomatic tensions, a meeting between UK defence

minister Ben Wallace and his French counterpart Florence Parly this week has been postponed.

Separately Mr Johnson used a meeting with Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos in New York late yesterday to press the tech billionaire on tax and his support for climate change.

“The Prime Minister raised the issue of taxation, and hoped progress could be made in implementing the G7 agreement on tax,” a Downing Street spokesperson

said. Bezos pledged yesterday to give $1 billion in grants this year for conservation, and No 10 said he and Mr Johsonnson agreed to work together to see what more could be done in the run-up to COP26.

Meanwhile Mr Johnson’s alleged former lover Jennifer Arcuri was today set to give evidence to the London Assembly’s oversight committee over her involvement in overseas trade missions while he was London Mayor.