THERESA May has “full faith” in Sir Kim Darroch, Britain’s ambassador to the US, as more calls were made for him to go following the leaking of private emails about his views on the Trump administration.
Liam Fox, the International Trade Secretary, who coincidentally is today in Washington for meetings with representatives of the US Congress on trade matters, said the “malicious” leaks were “unprofessional…unethical and they are unpatriotic”.
He noted: "This is such a damaging, potentially damaging, event, that I hope the full force of our internal discipline, or even the law, will come down on whoever actually carried out this particular act."
READ MORE: Government inquiry begins into leaked "inept" Trump administration emails
But the Scot added: "I don't see, frankly, that this is an impediment to the ambassador being able to work in Washington."
However, Robin Renwick, a former ambassador to the US, told BBC Radio 5 Live that Sir Kim would “not be able to be kept in post” as his position had become “untenable” and would leave after “a decent interval”.
At Downing’s regular morning briefing for reporters, the Prime Minister’s spokesman, when asked if Mrs May still had confidence in Sir Kim, replied: “The PM has full faith in her ambassador to Washington. Our ambassadors provide honest, unvarnished assessments of politics in their country. Those views are not necessarily the views of ministers or indeed the Government.
“As the Foreign Secretary has said this leak is not acceptable. We would expect such advice to be handled in the correct way and a leak inquiry has been launched.”
The spokesman described the probe as a “cross-government investigation” led by the Cabinet Office. He said it would “not be helpful” to go into detail about what the inquiry would be looking into. It is envisaged that the results will go back to Sir Mark Sedwill, the Cabinet Secretary and head of the civil service, as soon as possible.
Asked if Scotland Yard should now get involved, he replied: “If evidence of criminality is found, the police would then be involved. Until that point, the investigation will be cross-government led by the Cabinet Office.”
Responding to Sir Kim's views, Mr Trump declared: "The ambassador has not served the UK well, I can tell you that."
He added: "We're not big fans of that man...I can say things about him but I won't bother."
The ambassador’s leaked emails date from 2017 to the present day.
In them, he said: "We don't really believe this administration is going to become substantially more normal; less dysfunctional; less unpredictable; less faction-riven; less diplomatically clumsy and inept."
READ MORE: Trump hits back in diplomatic storm over assessment of his ‘inept’ White House
Sir Kim also suggested rumours of "infighting and chaos" in the White House were mostly true and policy on sensitive issues such as Iran was "incoherent, chaotic".
Although the Mueller investigation found allegations of conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia were not proven, Britain’s top diplomat to the US noted: "The worst cannot be ruled out."
The ambassador also doubted whether the Trump White House would “ever look competent" but also warned the President should not be written off.
Asked if Mrs May agreed with Sir Kim's view of the Trump administration, her spokesman said: "The PM does not agree with that assessment."
He added: "The Prime Minister has a good relationship with the President and the Government works closely and constructively with the administration across a wide range of issues."
The spokesman stressed there was "nothing to suggest" hostile state actors had been involved in the leak.
Mrs May held private talks with Mr Trump on Friday evening but they spoke about security matters and not the leaked emails.
Asked if the PM intended in the next 48 hours to speak to the President, her spokesman replied: “The PM spoke with him on Friday. If there are any further conversations I will let you know.”
Asked if the UK Government had apologised for the leaked comments, the spokesman said there had been “contact” between officials but he declined to get into the precise detail of the conversations.
He added: "The leak is absolutely unacceptable and as you would expect contact has been made with the Trump administration setting out our view that we believe that it is unacceptable."
Dr Fox, who is due to have a meeting with Ivanka Trump, the President's daughter and adviser, was asked if he would apologise for the ambassador's remarks and replied: "I will be apologising for the fact that either our civil service, or elements of our political class, have not lived up to the expectations that, either we have or the United States has about their behaviour, which in this particular case has lapsed in a most extraordinary and unacceptable way."
Lord Renwick said he did not agree with Sir Kim on several points but stressed he had the right to put forward his opinion.
“If you undermine that, it’s a waste of time appointing highly-qualified people to be ambassadors in Washington if he cannot then tell confidentially the Prime Minister what he thinks and what he suggests we should do about it.”
The retired cross-bench peer went on: “He hasn’t done anything wrong but his position has become untenable.
“There will, of course, be a decent interval. He will then have to be moved on. So, the leaker has rendered his position untenable and it has completely undermined any relationship of confidence he might have with Trump and his administration. That’s not Darroch’s fault but we’ve got to put a stop to this because every ambassador right now writing a cable to London is starting to wonder: ‘What is this going to look like if it ends up in the papers?’”
Earlier, Jeremy Hunt made clear he did not agree with all the views expressed by Sir Kim in the leaked messages as he insisted Britain had the "warmest" of relationships with America.
Speaking at a press conference at the Foreign Office, the Secretary of State said: "It's a personal view and there will be many people in this building who don't agree with that view and indeed I don't agree with some of the views that we saw in those letters.
“The US administration is highly effective and we have the warmest of relationships and a partnership based on standing up for shared values.
"So, it's very important that our ambassadors and high commissioners around the world continue to feel that they are able to express those frank views because we have one of the best diplomatic networks in the world and the foundation of that is the free exchange of information and opinions and the understanding that we're not always going to agree with each other but we want to know what people around the world are thinking."
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage was critical of some of the contents of the leaked emails. He said: "For Sir Kim Darroch to openly speculate that Trump could be involved with dodgy Russians, and this could make the administration crash and burn... pretty irresponsible. No basis of truth in it whatsoever."
The Brexit Party leader was asked if he might be the right person to be Britain's ambassador to the US and insisted: “No. I don't think I'm the right man for that job,” noting how it was something of an understatement to say he was not a diplomat.
"But, am I the right man to try and help forge a better, closer relationship in terms of intelligence, security and trade with an administration that contains friends of mine? Yes, I could be very useful," he added.
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