British Prime Minister Andy Burnham has confirmed the Kremlin’s participation in his country’s 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union, the Observer newspaper reported on October 11.
Burnham asked about Kremlin involvement when he became prime minister in July, the Observer reported, where he said he received “the clear answer that yes, there was.”
The Observer reports that Burnham made his comments on one of the UK’s biggest political podcasts, The Rest is Politics, the episode of which is due to be released on October 12.
It would be the first public acknowledgment by a British prime minister of Russia’s role in the country’s divisive Brexit campaign, in which the country decided to leave the EU with 52% favoring and 48% wanting to stay in the bloc.
Russia has long been suspected of being behind Euroscepticism in the UK and other European countries, and of working to support the campaign to leave the country more than a decade ago.
Burnham’s comments came days after he visited his German counterpart Friedrich Merz in Berlin.
In Germany, the pro-Russian Alternative for Germany party enjoys record support and won elections in the eastern regions of Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in September.
“It is important now that these things are clearly recorded and, I believe, help German and French voters understand that some of this policy is instigated by our enemies, namely Russia,” Burnham reports, according to the Observer.
The comments also emerge as Burnham strives to deepen ties with the EU, a process that began under his predecessors Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer, and which was helped by a shared commitment to support Ukraine.
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