There is no place in the world more important for the global supply of oil than the Strait of Hormuz.
The channel, which is only 21 miles (33.7 kilometers) wide at its narrowest point, is the only way to move oil from the Persian Gulf to the world's oceans. And that's why the seizure of a British-flagged ship in the strait Friday is such a concern.
If the Strait were to be closed,it would be a massive blow to the world's economy.
The Strait of Hormuz, which links the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf, "is the world's most important choke point," said the US Energy Information Administration.
The Strait is even narrower than its 21-mile width suggests. The shipping channels that can handle massive supertankers are only two miles wide heading in and out of the Gulf, forcing ships to pass through Iranian and Omani territorial waters.
And the amount of oil that passes through the channel is staggering, with roughly 80% of the crude it handles destined for markets in Asia. The world's global economy could not function without that supply of oil lubricating it.
About 22.5 million barrels of oil a day passed through the Strait of Hormuz on average since the start of 2018, according to Vortexa, an energy analytics firm. That's roughly 24% of daily global oil production, and nearly 30% of oil moving over the world's oceans.
In British PM race, a former Russian tycoon quietly wields influence
Publicly, industrialist and Conservative Party donor Alexander Temerko presents himself as an opponent of Brexit and a dissident critic of Vladimir Putin. In conversations with this reporter, he’s voiced strong support for Boris Johnson’s bid to lead Britain out of the EU, praised senior Russian intelligence officials and spoken about his past work with the Kremlin.
By Catherine Belton
Filed
LONDON - For almost a decade, Alexander Temerko, who forged a career at the top of the Russian arms industry and had connections at the highest levels of the Kremlin, has been an influential figure in British politics. He’s one of the Conservative Party’s major donors. He counts Boris Johnson, the frontrunner to be Britain’s next PM, among his friends.
Temerko, born in what was then Soviet Ukraine, presents himself in public as an entrepreneur who opposes Britain’s departure from the European Union because it’s bad for his UK energy business, and as a dissident critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But in more than half a dozen conversations with this reporter, conducted over the past three years as part of research for a book, he showed a different side of his career and views.
Temerko revealed himself to be a supporter of Johnson’s bid to lead Britain out of the EU, describing the 2016 public vote to leave the bloc as a “revolution against bureaucracy.” He praised senior Russian security officials, including the current and former heads of the Federal Security Service (FSB), successor to the KGB, and proudly recalled his past work with Russia’s Defence Ministry.
These new insights into Temerko’s private thinking about Johnson, Brexit and Russia come as the ruling Conservative Party is choosing its next leader, and as some British MPs are increasingly wary of possible Russian influence over British politics.
The result of the Conservative Party leadership contest is expected on July 23.
Temerko has gifted more than £1 million to the Conservatives since he gained British citizenship in 2011, electoral finance records show - a significant amount by UK standards.
Johnson is not among the politicians recorded as having received donations from Temerko. But the industrialist has financed some of Johnson’s important allies in parliament, including one of the men running his campaign for the Tory leadership, James Wharton, who also serves as a paid adviser to the UK energy firm where Temerko is a director.
Temerko spoke warmly about his “friend” Johnson, telling how the two men sometimes call each other “Sasha,” the Russian diminutive for Alexander, which is Johnson’s real first name. He described how, at the beginning of Johnson’s tenure as Foreign Secretary from 2016 to 2018, they would often “plot” late into the evening over a bottle of wine on the balcony of Johnson’s office at parliament in Westminster.
Johnson’s press secretary Lee Cain didn’t respond to repeated requests for comment for this article. The Conservative Party said only that “donations to the Conservative Party are properly and transparently declared to the Electoral Commission, published by them, and fully comply with the law.”
In one conversation in February this year, Temerko said he’d joined an unsuccessful attempt led by members of a group of hardline Conservative MPs, the European Research Group, to remove Theresa May as leader in December 2018. The MPs were unhappy at May’s failure to take Britain out of the EU almost three years after Britons voted to leave. Temerko didn’t detail his role in the move, but a senior Conservative Party member confirmed that Temerko was “very much behind the attempt to oust” May. The party member declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter. May finally resigned on June 7.
Jacob Rees Mogg, chairman of the European Research Group, said in response to Reuters’ questions that Temerko “has no link formal or informal” with the group. Rees Mogg said he didn’t know Temerko, but couldn’t speak for Temerko’s relationship with individual MPs. May’s office referred Reuters’ questions about the episode to the Conservative Party, which didn’t comment.
In the same conversation in February, Temerko spoke in positive terms about one of Putin’s closest and most powerful allies, Nikolai Patrushev, the hawkish head of Russia’s Security Council and former long-time head of the FSB security service, describing him as a “decent family man.” On another occasion, he said of Patrushev, “There is much more positive than negative about him.”
SECURITY TSAR: Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev, left, is the head of Russia’s Security Council and a former head of the FSB security service. REUTERS/Sergei Karpukhin
One of Temerko’s former business partners in Russia, Leonid Nevzlin, said Temerko had long-standing ties with Russian security agencies, but declined to say whether he believes those ties remain active. Nevzlin and Temerko were shareholders in oil firm Yukos, before Putin’s government seized control of the company. Nevzlin, who was one of the main shareholders, said Yukos’s management brought Temerko in “for several projects as well as for his contacts at the top of the Federal Security Service and the Defence Ministry.” Nevzlin added that Temerko knew Patrushev “well.”
Asked to respond, Temerko said in a follow-up interview this week that his role at Yukos encompassed the oil company’s connections with the entire Russian state, not just with the Defence Ministry. His relations with people in the security services, he added, were “formal” and not “personal.” He denied having any ongoing links with Russian security services.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Temerko “has no connection to the Kremlin or the Russian authorities. We do not know this gentleman.” Reuters couldn’t reach Patrushev for comment.
RIVAL: Jeremy Hunt is competing against Boris Johnson for the Conservative Party leadership. REUTERS/Peter Nicholls
“Jeremy is very dangerous. He really does occupy the centre ground. He’s very clever. He’s a person of the system.”
Asked this week about the apparent contradiction between his private and public statements on Brexit, Temerko said his views changed with time and he was “evolutionary.” He said he joined the push to oust May because he thought she should be more flexible in negotiating a route out of the EU.
In recent weeks, as Johnson’s campaign gathered pace, Temerko has appeared to distance himself from his friend. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph in June, Temerko said he was switching support from Johnson to his rival, Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, over Johnson’s apparent willingness to take Britain out of the EU without securing an agreement over the terms of the withdrawal. Temerko repeated this stance in a blog post for the Huffington Post on July 3, calling for Conservatives to reject the “fairytale” being offered by the “fun blonde guy,” a reference to the fair-haired Johnson.
As recently as February, Temerko told this reporter: “Jeremy is very dangerous. He really does occupy the centre ground. He's very clever. He’s a person of the system.” There is no record of Temerko providing any financing to Hunt, and none of Temerko’s longstanding allies work on the Hunt campaign. A spokesperson for Hunt declined to comment.
KREMLIN’S SHADOW: A British parliamentary committee called in February for the British government to investigate attempts by Russia to influence the June 2016 referendum on Britain’s EU membership. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov
“We know the Kremlin seeks to disrupt, destabilise and influence our democracy in a number of ways.”
This portrait of Temerko and his activity comes as some MPs worry about possible Russian interference in British democracy. In February this year, parliament’s committee overseeing digital and media matters called on the government to investigate attempts by Russia to influence the June 2016 referendum on Britain’s EU membership, amid growing evidence in the United States and elsewhere that the Kremlin has been pursuing a campaign to divide and disrupt Western democracies.
Ben Bradshaw, a senior Labour parliamentarian who was the first MP to raise concern about potential Kremlin interference in the 2016 Brexit referendum, said Reuters’ findings were “extremely troubling.”
“We know the Kremlin seeks to disrupt, destabilise and influence our democracy in a number of ways. We must have complete confidence that the close relationships between Conservative politicians and Russian business people with ties to the Putin regime are above board and free from Kremlin influencing operations. The fact that an ex Tory MP who is running Johnson’s leadership campaign is employed by Mr Temerko is extraordinary.”
The senior Conservative with knowledge of Temerko’s efforts to remove May said some members of the party had distanced themselves from the businessman in recent months, as concerns have grown over Temerko’s Russian connections. But “others,” he said with reference to Johnson, were “still close.” The party member indicated that Conservative Chairman Brandon Lewis and Sir Graham Brady, then the head of the Conservative Party’s 1922 Committee, a parliamentary group, had been briefed about these concerns. The source declined to give further details about the briefings. Brady did not respond to an emailed request for comment. A spokesperson for Lewis declined to comment. The Conservative Party didn’t comment.
CENTRE OF POWER: Britain's Conservative Party Chairman Brandon Lewis arrives at the PM’s Downing Street office earlier this year. REUTERS/Toby Melville
NO CONFIDENCE: Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee that groups Conservative MPs, pictured in December 2018 after announcing the party would hold a vote of no confidence in PM Theresa May. REUTERS/Phil Noble
Electoral Commission records show Temerko, and UK companies linked to him, have made donations to 11 individual MPs, including Lewis, the chairman of the Tory Party, while helping fund as many as 27 local branches of the Conservative Party in areas where Tory MPs won election in the north of England, Wales and London. There is no record of him providing funds to Johnson or to his constituency, and this year much of his funding activity seems to have petered out.
In the February 2019 conversation, as May faced overwhelming parliamentary opposition to her EU withdrawal agreement, Temerko forecast that if Brexit isn’t implemented, “the time of the mainstream parties will end,” and “the old system will be destroyed.” His friend Johnson, he predicted then, could lead a new movement backing Brexit.
Those comments about a new political era chimed with remarks by Russian President Vladimir Putin. In an interview with the Financial Times in June, Putin trumpeted the rise of national populist movements in Europe and the United States, saying that “the liberal idea has become obsolete.” Putin has rarely commented directly on Brexit, which he says is a matter for the British people. At his annual press conference in December 2018, he decried the idea of holding a second referendum on Brexit and said the UK government had to implement Britain’s departure from the EU, otherwise faith in democratic procedures would be undermined.
From Russia to London
Temerko rose to prominence in the Russia arms industry in the 1990s, in the wild days that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Three former Russian business partners, including Nevzlin, as well as a former Russian intelligence officer, said Temerko grew close with the Russian security services. Those ties were forged in the 1990s, these people said, when Temerko served as head of a state committee for the military and later as head of a strategic Russian state arms company known as Russkoye Oruzhie, or Russian Weapons. Russkoye Oruzhie no longer exists.
RUSSIA DAYS: Alexander Temerko, pictured in 2003, sat on the board of Russian oil firm Yukos during a successful career in Russia. REUTERS/Kommersant Photo/Ilya Pitalev
Temerko cultivated close relations with the Russian defence minister of the early 1990s, Pavel Grachev. Temerko has described the late Grachev as his “handler.” Temerko has boasted to this reporter that he himself had three-star and four-star Russian generals working under him.
In 1999, Temerko became a member of the board and significant shareholder at one of the new Russia’s most successful companies, Yukos, led by the charismatic billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Temerko said he helped Yukos secure a lucrative contract to supply the Russian army with oil. As head of the firm’s government relations, he’d also led a push by Yukos to build an oil pipeline to China and, according to one of the former business partners, he’d travelled with other Yukos officials on many business trips they made abroad.
“He knew the Russian ambassadors and consuls of every country,” this former business partner said. Temerko said he knew many but not all of them.
OIL WEALTH: The Priobskoye oil field in Siberia was a prize asset of oil firm Yugansk, formerly part of Yukos. REUTERS/Sergei Karpukhin
Things went sour for Yukos when Khodorkovsky tried to build a political power base for himself.
When Khodorkovsky was arrested and jailed on fraud charges in October 2003, Temerko was the only Yukos shareholder who remained in the country to negotiate with the Kremlin. The remaining shareholders fled fearing they would face arrest. Temerko told how his standing with the Kremlin was such that he was able to try to negotiate about ways to preserve Yukos and secure Khodorkovsky’s release directly with Igor Sechin, the then-deputy head of the Kremlin administration and the Putin security man seen as the mastermind behind the Kremlin campaign to take over Yukos.
Temerko said that in those days his status meant he was essentially untouchable. His security ties, he said, once got him access to a meeting of the Russian Security Council, the circle of 24 top Russian officials, chaired by Putin, who steer national security policy.
In the event, Khodorkovsky remained in jail for 10 years, while Temerko also fled. Sechin has previously denied orchestrating the legal campaign to take over Yukos. Sechin could not be reached for comment for this article.
JAILED: Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky spent 10 years in a Russian jail after being found guilty of fraud and tax evasion. REUTERS/Grigory Dukor
New friends in high places
Temerko arrived in Britain in 2005, saying he was a refugee from the politically charged takeover of Yukos. The Russian government had charged him with defrauding the state oil major Rosneft. Temerko denied the charge, saying the case was part of the Russian government’s campaign against Yukos and its former top managers. The High Court in London declined a Russian request for Temerko’s extradition in December 2005, saying it was politically motivated. The case bolstered his standing as a Russian dissident who’d suffered at the hands of the Russian state, helping secure his footing as a donor who could be trusted.
Temerko won entrée to the top of the Conservative Party during David Cameron’s premiership that began in 2010. At the time, according to Russian financier and Conservative Party activist, Sergei Cristo, the Tories were seeking new sources of cash following the 2008 financial crisis. Temerko paid £90,000 for a bronze bust of Cameron at a fundraising auction in 2013, now displayed at the Carlton Club, an exclusive London private members club. Cameron couldn’t be reached for comment.
ALLY: Temerko won entree to the top of the Conservative Party during David Cameron’s premiership. REUTERS/Toby Melville
Temerko’s donations translated into access. In 2014, he was appointed by the local branch of the party as a vice-president of the Cities of London and Westminster Conservative Association, which delivered even greater opportunity to mix with leading Tories. Temerko also became part of Conservative Party donor club The Leader’s Group, where £50,000 in annual membership fees grants access to the prime minister and other senior ministers at dinners, cocktail receptions and other events. In the conversations of the last three years, Temerko boasted he played an important role in securing election victories for the Conservative Party at a time when it “was fighting for every vote.”
Together with OGN Group, a major steel manufacturer in the UK’s northeast, where he served as director, he said he’d sponsored 40 members of parliament in previous elections. “My business was one of the biggest businesses that supported the Conservative Party and its deputies in northern England,” he said in the February 2019 conversation, adding he’d brought in supporters from Britain’s East European minority. OGN Group is now in liquidation. The Conservative Party didn’t comment.
In public remarks, Temerko has consistently said he opposes Brexit because it will damage his UK business interests, which now centre on a firm, Aquind Ltd, developing an undersea electric power link between Britain and France. On his website he says he is a “vocal supporter” of British membership of the EU.
While Temerko has publicly spoken out against Brexit, and has made donations to parliamentarians who campaigned to remain in the EU, at least two Conservative politicians close to Temerko played key roles on the Brexit side in the run-up to the June 2016 referendum.
ADVISER: Former Conservative MP James Wharton is a paid adviser to Aquind Ltd, where Temerko serves as a director. REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett
One of them is Wharton, a former Conservative MP who is overseeing Johnson’s leadership campaign, at the same time as being a paid adviser to the power firm Aquind Ltd where Temerko is a director. In June 2013, Wharton put forward the parliamentary bill that first called for a referendum on Britain’s EU membership. Temerko made £25,000 in political donations to Wharton between 2013 and 2015, disclosures to parliament show, a relatively large figure for an individual British MP, helping fund his re-election in 2015 in a constituency neighbouring Temerko’s OGN Group steel works. Wharton didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The minister of state for exiting the EU, Martin Callanan, served on the board of Temerko’s Aquind from May 2016 to June 2017, at which time he joined the government. Callanan didn’t respond to a request for comment.
In a conversation with this reporter in July 2016, shortly after Britons voted to leave the EU, Temerko was jubilant about the possibilities of Johnson leading Britain’s exit from the bloc. By then, Johnson was the most powerful figure in the “Leave” campaign.
“We know that if Boris is our elected leader then our party membership will grow. There would be massive support for our party at election,” he said at the time. The vote to leave the EU, he added, was “a revolution against bureaucracy.”
During the same conversation, Temerko said “a group of East European businessmen” had helped sway Johnson into siding in February 2016 with campaigners for Britain’s departure from the EU after months of sitting on the fence. But Temerko declined to name any of these East European businessmen and declined to repeat this comment.
Temerko’s allies are at the helm of Johnson’s campaign.
Wharton, the adviser to Temerko’s power firm Aquind Ltd, has overseen the day to day running of Johnson’s campaign, particularly in its initial stages.
”GOOD LAD”: Temerko has described former Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson as “a good lad.” REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis
Gavin Williamson, the former UK defence secretary whom Temerko has frequently described as “a good lad,” helped lead Johnson’s campaign to win the support of his parliamentary colleagues to replace Theresa May. Conservative parliamentarians whittled the field down to two candidates in a series of votes in June before handing the final choice to the party’s estimated 160,000 members. Williamson declined to comment.
Temerko says he is “friends” with political strategist Sir Lynton Crosby, whose firm, CTF Partners, gave Johnson a £20,000 interest free loan and a £3,000 cash donation late last year, according to a disclosure to parliament by Johnson. A co-founder of CTF, Mark Fullbrook, is the Johnson campaign’s chief executive. Crosby declined to comment. CTF says it isn’t involved in the Johnson campaign and Fullbrook is on a leave of absence, working voluntarily for Johnson’s leadership bid.
Temerko has said his days as a power player in Moscow are over. He has told this reporter he is now persona non-grata with the Russian authorities, especially after he publicly called in 2015 for the UK to supply weapons to Ukraine to assist it in its war with pro-Kremlin separatists on the grounds that only a show of force would stop the conflict.
“They consider that I am among those who directed the UK government against them. I am a warmonger. I am more of an enemy now than when I was in Yukos,” he said.
Kremlin spokesman Peskov said he couldn’t comment because he doesn’t know who Temerko is.
Temerko retains at least one powerful connection, however.
One of Temerko’s former business partners said the industrialist is in contact with Andrei Guryev, the owner of Russian fertilizer giant Phosagro. Guryev, too, has become a notable figure in Britain. He owns Witanhurst, a vast estate in Highgate in the north of London that is the UK’s second biggest house after Buckingham Palace. Guryev declined to comment.
Temerko confirmed his friendship with Guryev. “Guryev is a good guy,” Temerko said. “He’s a very nice character. He’s a sportsman. He’s a kind fellow.”
DIVIDED NATION: Anti-Brexit demonstrators protest outside the Houses of Parliament in London earlier this year. REUTERS/Hannah McKay
Alexander Temerko’s circle, past and present
Alexander Temerko – a Conservative Party donor who was born in Soviet Ukraine and forged a career at the top of the Russian arms industry.
Nikolai Patrushev – the head of Russia’s Security Council and former long-time head of Russia’s FSB security service.
Leonid Nevzlin – one of Temerko’s former business partners in Russia. Nevzlin and Temerko were shareholders in oil firm Yukos.
Pavel Grachev – Russian defence minister of the early 1990s. Temerko has described the late Grachev as his “handler.”
Igor Sechin – the then-deputy head of the Kremlin administration. Sechin now heads state oil firm Rosneft.
Mikhail Khodorkovsky – Yukos’ main owner. He was arrested and jailed on fraud charges in 2003 and spent 10 years in prison.
Andrei Guryev – the owner of Russian fertilizer giant Phosagro.
Boris Johnson – the frontrunner to be the next Conservative Party leader, and Britain’s next PM.
James Wharton – a former Conservative MP who is overseeing Johnson’s leadership campaign and is a paid adviser to power firm Aquind Ltd where Temerko is a director.
Martin Callanan – Britain’s minister of state for exiting the EU. He served on the board of Temerko’s Aquind from May 2016 to June 2017.
Gavin Williamson – the former UK defence secretary helped lead Johnson’s campaign to win the support of his parliamentary colleagues to replace Theresa May
Sir Lynton Crosby – a political strategist, whose firm, CTF Partners, gave Johnson a £20,000 interest free loan and a £3,000 cash donation late last year, according to a disclosure to parliament by Johnson.
British parliamentarians dealt a blow on Thursday both to the dying embers of Prime Minister Theresa May's administration and to the likely next leader, Boris Johnson, even before he's been confirmed.
MPs defeated the government in a vote that should thwart any efforts to suspend parliament in order to push through a "no-deal" Brexit.
Parliament has repeatedly voted against allowing a "no-deal" withdrawal from the European Union, and the notion of suspending - or "proroguing" - the elected chamber had been mooted as the most likely way the next prime minister would be able to force the United Kingdom to crash out without a deal.
Such an eventuality, analysts say, would trigger a near-unprecedented consitutional crisis.
Johnson has made the UK's withdrawal on October 31 - "with or without a deal" - the central thrust of his campaign to become the next leader of the country's ruling Conservative Party, and has never ruled out the possibility of proroguing parliament in order to get his way.
"Many assume Boris Johnson will be the next British prime minister," said Al Jazeera's Jonah Hull, reporting from Westminster.
Tory leadership debate: Johnson edges closer to power
"During his leadership campaign he has set out a number of new red lines which will make getting a new exit deal with the EU more difficult, if that were even possible within the timeline we have. Now we have this vote which makes getting a 'no-deal' exit much more complicated for him.
"And so we're into the territory, presumably, of considering another extension before withdrawal, and during that time another general election. And that isn't a prospect relished by the Conservatives, because there's no guarantee they'd win it. Which means some Conservatives might even start pushing for a second Brexit referendum."
Rebellion
The move to block any suspension was backed in the House of Commons with a majority of 41 votes - 315 to 274 - after several senior government figures abstained.
Chancellor Philip Hammond, Justice Secretary David Gauke, Business Secretary Greg Clark and International Development Secretary Rory Stewart were among the Cabinet ministers who did not vote.
Margot James resigned as minister for digital and the creative industries to support the amendment.
"The prime minister is obviously disappointed that a number of ministers failed to vote in this afternoon's division," said a statement from May's office, which concluded with a slightly foreboding statement: "No doubt her successor will take this into account when forming their government."
In total, 17 Conservatives voted against the government, despite a three-line whip - essentially the strongest possible insistence from the leadership to toe the party line - indicating both the May administration's lack of authority now and the strength of feeling against "no-deal" on Tory benches.
The Conservatives are in power with a minority government by virtue of a supply-and-confidence deal with Northern Ireland's DUP. Their working majority is so slim that 17 of their own MPs voting against the government will worry the incoming administration. For all intents and purposes, Johnson has lost his ability to govern before even taking office.
How did they do it?
In a deft wrangling of parliamentary procedure, a relatively routine motion put before parliament - which essentially delayed the approval of a budget for the devolved legislature of Northern Ireland which has not sat for more than two years amid its own consitutional crisis - had an amendment added to it by Labour's Hilary Benn and Alistair Burt of the Conservatives.
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The amendment enshrines in law that the government must update parliament every two weeks on progress in talks to restore the Northern Ireland Assembly, and that parliament must be in session for five days after each update in order to debate it.
This, in essence, means the House of Commons will have to sit through the autumn session, and members can't be sent home in order for a "no-deal" Brexit to happen by automatic operation of law on October 31, while parliament is suspended.
The House of Lords, the UK parliament's upper chamber, strongly backed a bid to block any suspension of parliament by a margin of 103 votes on Wednesday.
Gauke said before the vote that proroguing parliament would be "outrageous".
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "At a crucial point in this country's history, if you like - that parliament should not be able to sit, should not be able to express its opinion and its will, I think would be outrageous.
"I very much doubt that any prime minister would in fact suspend parliament in these circumstances, but I can understand the concerns that a lot of my colleagues have."
Gauke, Clark and Hammond are at the centre of influential Conservative politicians who will provide a counterweight to Johnson's push for an immediate exit from the EU.
The knife crime epidemic plaguing England and Wales has reached a record high in 2018-19 with such offenses increase by at least 8 percent, new figures show.
The data released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that there were 43,516 police-recorded offenses involving a knife or sharp instrument, the highest figure since such records began in 2011.
The data doesn’t take into account the crimes recorded by Scottish authorities and Greater Manchester Police, which patrols parts of the 9th largest city in Britain, Sky News reported.
“The picture of crime is a complex one. Overall levels of crime have remained steady, but this is not the case for all types of crime,” said ONS’ Mark Bangs, adding that there were increases in “violent crimes involving knives and sharp instruments” and “fraud and overall theft.”
The increasing knife crime is particularly evident in London, where Mayor Sadiq Khan has been trying to contain the problem.
While politicians and experts have called for different policing, Khan decried the rampant knife crime as the “human cost of austerity.”
“The sad reality is the violence we're seeing on our streets today is an appalling side effect of increasing inequality and alienation caused by years of austerity and neglect,” he said in public remarks earlier this week.
“The sad reality is the violence we're seeing on our streets today is an appalling side effect of increasing inequality and alienation caused by years of austerity and neglect.”
— Sadiq Khan
He added that there’s a “direct link” between poverty and violent crime, according to the data published the City Hall.
The fiscal watchdog said economic growth would fall by 2% by the end of 2020 if it left the bloc without an agreement.
'Not impressed by threat'
In his first UK broadcast interview - conducted in May before the start of the Conservative leadership contest - Mr Barnier was asked what would happen if the UK "just tore up the membership card" for the EU.
"The UK will have to face the consequences," he replied.
Asked whether the UK had ever genuinely threatened to leave in such a way with no deal, Mr Barnier said: "I think that the UK side, which is well informed and competent and knows the way we work on the EU side, knew from the very beginning that we've never been impressed by such a threat.
"It's not useful to use it."
Panorama: Britain's Brexit Crisis will be broadcast on Thursday at 21:00 BST.
Conservative Party leadership contender Jeremy Hunt told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the fact the EU "never believed that no deal was a credible threat" was "one of our mistakes in the last two years".
He said while there will be economic consequences to no deal, "we are much better prepared for no deal than we were before".
He said the issue of the Northern Ireland border could be solved with "existing technology" and the controversial Irish backstop, which aims to prevent a hard border on the island of Ireland, "isn't going to happen".
Former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, a key figure in Boris Johnson's leadership campaign, accused Mr Barnier of trying to "threaten" the UK.
He said Mr Barnier's remarks were an indictment of Britain's negotiating strategy and showed "how useless" Mrs May's approach had been.
Leadership frontrunner Mr Johnson was asked for an interview by Panorama, but he declined.
Elsewhere in the programme, Mrs May's de facto deputy David Lidington revealed that a senior EU official made a secret offer to the UK to put Brexit on hold for five years and negotiate a "new deal for Europe".
Mr Lidington said the offer was passed on in 2018 by Martin Selmayr, a senior aide to EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker.
"Martin sort of said, 'Look, why don't we have a deal whereby we just put all this on ice for five years?'
"Let's see how things go, let's get the UK involved with France and Germany, let's see how the dust settles and let's talk about whether we can come to a new deal for Europe.'"
In his own interview for the programme - also recorded in May - Mr Selmayr said he was "very certain" the UK was not ready to leave without a deal before the original Brexit deadline in March this year.
"We have seen what has been prepared on our side of the border for a hard Brexit. We don't see the same level of preparation on the other side of the border," he added.
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In another interview for the programme, the EU Commission's First Vice-President, Frans Timmermans, said UK ministers were "running around like idiots" when they arrived to negotiate Brexit in 2017.
Mr Timmermans said while he expected a "Harry Potter-like book of tricks" from ministers, instead they were like a character from from Dad's Army.
In an interview in March 2019 with the BBC's Nick Robinson, Mr Timmermans said he found it "shocking" how unprepared the UK team was when it began negotiations.
"We thought they are so brilliant," he said. "That in some vault somewhere in Westminster there will be a Harry Potter-like book with all the tricks and all the things in it to do."
But after seeing the then-Brexit Secretary David Davis - who resigned over his disagreements with the deal - speaking in public, his mind changed.
"I saw him not coming, not negotiating, grandstanding elsewhere [and] I thought, 'Oh my God, they haven't got a plan, they haven't got a plan.'
"That was really shocking, frankly, because the damage if you don't have a plan...
"Time's running out and you don't have a plan. It's like Lance Corporal Jones, you know, 'Don't panic, don't panic!' Running around like idiots."
'Playing games'
Mr Timmermans - interviewed two months before Mrs May announced her resignation - also criticised Boris Johnson's approach to Brexit negotiations from when they began.
"Perhaps I am being a bit harsh, but it is about time we became a bit harsh. I am not sure he was being genuine," he said.
"I have always had the impression he is playing games."
Negotiations between the UK and EU began in 2017 after Prime Minister Theresa May triggered the Article 50 process to leave the bloc.
At the end of 2018, a withdrawal agreement was settled between the two sides and EU officials said the matter was closed.
But MPs voted against the plan three times, which led to a number of delays to the exit date - now set for 31 October.
When millions of people took to the streets of Hong Kong in recent weeks to protest an extradition bill that would make it easier for people arrested in the city to face trial elsewhere, including mainland China, several countries, such as Canada and the U.S., as well as the European Union defended the protesters.
But for perhaps no country is this more personal than Britain. As Hong Kong’s former colonial power, Britain played a primary role in the city’s return to Chinese sovereignty more than two decades ago. It’s also a signatory to the agreement guaranteeing Hong Kong’s limited autonomy from Beijing—a status protesters fear is now under threat. But the political impasse over Brexit is dominating British political discourse, ensuring that issues like Hong Kong remain in the foreign-policy periphery.
Still, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt raised the topic in a statement marking the 22nd anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to China.
“It is imperative that Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy, and the rights and freedoms of the Hong Kong people, are fully respected,” he said. “We have made our position on this clear to the Chinese Government, both publicly and in private, and will continue to do so.”
For the Chinese, however, what may have been acceptable in the 1990s, when Beijing was still a rising power, is no longer acceptable now. Liu Xiaoming, the Chinese ambassador to London, framed Hunt’s remarks as improper interference in China’s internal affairs.
“In the minds of some people, they regard Hong Kong as still under British rule,” he said in response, adding: “They forget … that Hong Kong has now returned to the embrace of the motherland.”
Britain’s connection to Hong Kong isn’t tenuous. Prior to its return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, the city was considered the last jewel of Britain’s colonial empire. When British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984, setting the terms of Hong Kong’s eventual transfer to Chinese control, both sides agreed that Hong Kong would retain for 50 years following the 1997 handover certain rights and freedoms not seen in mainland China. Under this “one country, two systems” arrangement, Hong Kong enjoys a degree of autonomy from Beijing, including an independent judiciary, and a separate financial and immigration system. Unlike residents of mainland China, for example, the people of Hong Kong have the right to freedom of expression and protest.
At the time, Britain envisioned that it would, if necessary, be able to help maintain Hong Kong’s autonomy. In briefing notes that have since been declassified by the British Foreign Office, Thatcher was advised to reaffirm that Britain would have the “right to raise any breaches with China after 1997” and that it “would not hesitate to do so.” Despite London’s concerns over the proposed extradition bill (which was suspended in response to the protests, though not withdrawn completely), it has stopped short of declaring the proposal a breach of the British-Chinese agreement—a charge that has only been made once, following the Chinese government’s crackdown on Hong Kong booksellers in 2016.
Some, such as Lord Chris Patten, the last British governor to Hong Kong, have argued that the efforts to undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy are enough to warrant further British action.
“The proposed legislation was at the very least a breach in the spirit of the joint declaration,” Benedict Rogers, the founder of the British NGO Hong Kong Watch and the deputy chairman of the U.K. Conservative Party’s Human Rights Commission, told me, noting that a failure to act could be interpreted by China as a “green light to continue encroaching on Hong Kong’s freedom.”
Still, such action would likely be ignored by Beijing, which has already stated in recent years that the agreement, much like Britain’s hold on Hong Kong, is merely historical and no longer holds any “practical significance.”
“There is nothing explicit in the joint declaration … no phrase that can be used to justify saying Britain has some legal responsibility to Hong Kong anymore,” Tim Summers, a former British diplomat and a Hong Kong–based senior consulting fellow at Chatham House, a British think tank, told me, explaining that even if Britain were to speak more forcefully on this issue, it lacks the leverage to change Beijing’s thinking. “More than what the U.K. says, Beijing is more sensitive to opinion and views in Hong Kong,” he said.
In any case, Britain’s responsibility to Hong Kong may be irrelevant. The country’s diminishing international presence—precipitated, in large part, by its political upheaval at home—hasn’t made its leverage any stronger. Its imminent exit from the EU, paired with its desire to strike bilateral trade deals around the world, has limited what Britain can (or is willing) to say to countries with whom it disagrees—so much so that the candidate tipped as most likely to become its next prime minister opted against defending Britain’s diplomat in Washington in order to please the American president.
“Britain would be in a stronger position if it can mobilize other countries to stand with it,” Rogers said. “What we can do alone is more limited than it used to be.”
But Patten, who has remained a strident critic of China’s influence in Hong Kong, as well as Britain’s response, or lack thereof, recently wrote that he subscribes to the “rather old-fashioned view that doing the right thing in foreign affairs is usually the right thing to do.”
“Britain may have lost some of its soft power recently. It would be nice to think, however, that it still understands how to behave with integrity,” he wrote in the Financial Times. “Our own ‘golden age’ with China should put more emphasis on honour and less on ‘fear and greed.’ That is where our national interest really lies.”
We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.
Yasmeen Serhan is a London-based staff writer at The Atlantic.
The five boats unveiled on Monday were each named after an environmental activist and bore the message "act now".
A blue boat was placed in front of the Royal Courts of Justice in west London, and protesters practised yoga and meditation in the middle of the road.
Transport for London said several buses had been placed on diversion due to the protest.
Extinction Rebellion said the protesters were there "to demand the legal system take responsibility in this crisis, and ensure the safety of future generations by making ecocide law".
"We also stand in solidarity with climate activists around the world who are sacrificing their freedom to fight for climate justice," it added.
The group is calling on the Metropolitan Police and Crown Prosecution Service to drop cases against those arrested during the April protests.
Demonstrators also set up tents on grass in front of Cardiff City Hall.
Stephen Lingwood, 37, from Extinction Rebellion Cardiff, said: "People are dying right now of climate chaos in places like India. It's only going to get worse.
"We're at the beginning of the sixth mass extinction and a climate genocide and the government's inaction is, in my view, criminally irresponsible."
Protesters set up camp on Bristol Bridge with a pink boat bearing the message "tell the truth", as Avon and Somerset Police and traffic management used concrete blocks to close the road to traffic.
Chief Inspector Mark Runacres, an area commander at Avon and Somerset Police, said the force had cancelled officers' rest days to make sure it had "sufficient resources" during the protest.
"Any unplanned and lengthy road closure could impact on the ability of emergency services to respond to incidents," he said.
"We... are factoring this into our plans so we can continue to keep the public safe,"
He added officers would be "robust" in dealing with any anti-social behaviour and disorder.
Campaigners in Glasgow blocked Trongate at the intersection of Gallowgate and High Street with a 25ft purple boat.
One message on the vessel said: "The future you fear is already here".
Glasgow City Council said Trongate was closed to all eastbound traffic between Albion Street and High Street.
The local authority urged road users to consider taking other routes and said there could be congestion on surrounding streets.
Meanwhile, on Victoria Bridge in the centre of Leeds, activists unveiled a yellow boat.
One demonstrator, Alex Evans, 43, said: "My eldest child is nine years old and for each of those nine years I've watched her future get steadily worse while everyone waits for everyone else to do something on climate change.
"Now we're out of time and we can see climate breakdown all around us. Enough's enough: it's time to act now."
Extinction Rebellion says the UK must act immediately to halt biodiversity loss and reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2025.
