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Lord Owen, an independent social democrat, said America nor the European Union were leading the world scene on conflicts around the world and Britain should step up. The Brexiteer, who
argues the UK’s global influence can be enhanced after it leaves the Brussels bloc, hit back at arguments the UK would lose its power after Brexit. Speaking on Sky News, presenter Adam
Boulton put it to him: “Successive prime ministers used to talk about Britain as a bridge between America and Europe, as a member of the European Union, and a close ally of the US. “The
perception is, on both banks, that’s been knocked away.” But Lord Owen disagreed, labelling the comments a “fallacy”. He said: “I don’t agree with that at all. I think it’s a complete
fallacy. Just look at the mess the EU made over Ukraine. “We’ve lost ten thousand people. It could have been a hundred thousand, it could have been a lot more.” However, Boulton
interjected: “Against that, the French and the Germans and with the Americans in the driving seat in trying to sort it out through the Minsk accords and we’re nowhere are we.” LEADSOM:
BREXIT WILL DELIVER CERTAINTY, CONTINUITY AND CONTROL The co-founder of the Social Democratic Party hit back and said Britain should have been involved. “I don’t think America is in the
driving seat over Ukraine, I think that’s been one of the problems,” he said. “We should’ve insisted on being involved. We were a guarantor of the Ukrainian border with four other countries
and we were barely seen.” Meanwhile, Michel Barnier launched an angry broadside at Britain over its refusal to accept that the UK will have to pay a divorce bill to leave the club. RELATED
ARTICLES The EU’s chief negotiator delivered a furious tirade in response to remarks by senior UK ministers indicating they will fight Brussels over its reported £80 billion demand. He said
Britain honouring its commitments to fund programmes across Europe was a question of “trust” and insisted the negotiations were going nowhere unless the Government changed its tune.
Westminster has been angered by reports coming out of Brussels that the European Union will ask for up to £80billion in the negotiations, with UK officials calculating our obligations at
around a third of that amount.