Right-wing broadcaster’s sarcastic response backfires. Will he now admit his error and give Corbyn’s ‘exemplary behaviour a wider currency’?
Andrew Neil’s sarcasm has backfired on him after he wrongly labelled ‘Corbynistas’ as supporters of Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Neil was taken to task by the @greenrecovery21 account after claiming ‘Corbynistas [are] thoroughly discredited when it comes to Ukraine – and responded sarcastically that he would give the ‘fascinating’ claim that Corbyn was a long-time critic of Putin ‘a wider currency’ if it could be substantiated.
And of course, it was – at the very least as far back as twenty-two years ago, as people were quick to point out:
In 2000, when then-PM Blair invited Putin to visit the UK, Corbyn condemned Blair’s mistake:
In 2001, Blair again flew to Russia to meet Putin – whom Blair praised for his ‘focus on what he wants to achieve in Russia – Corbyn said:
When the Prime Minister travels to Moscow—I imagine that he is already on his way there—and meets President Putin this evening, I hope that he will convey the condemnation of millions of people around the world of the activities of the Russian army in Chechnya and of what it is doing to ordinary people there. When images of what is happening are translated into other parts of the world, many people are horrified, just as we are horrified by what happened to the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon on 11 September.
If we are serious about the rule of law and human rights, we must be very careful to condemn abuses of human rights, whoever commits them
And as well as several recent tweets on the topic, Corbyn also put out a video condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
The mass of responses and comments led to Neil trending on UK Twitter.
So, does he have the backbone and honour to keep his word and ‘give a wider currency’ to Corbyn’s actual record when the rest of the UK’s supposedly ‘mainstream’ media and the current Labour regime, like Neil did, are making false claims about Corbyn’s record and about the left more generally?
Only time will tell. Over to you, Mr Neil.
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