War in Ukraine: MP praises Rishi Sunak G20 speech and claims he may be even bigger supporter than Boris Johnson

A Ukrainian MP has praised Rishi Sunak’s G20 speech and claimed the new Prime Minister may be an even bigger supporter of her country than Boris Johnson.

Kira Rudik, the leader of the liberal Holos party, claimed Ukrainians were worried by the multiple changes in Downing Street, but now understood it was Britain that backed them, regardless of who was in Number 10. The MP also praised Nicola Sturgeon and claimed Russian president Vladimir Putin dodged the G20 because he wanted to avoid “difficult questions”.

Asked about the multiple changes in Prime Minister, Ms Rudik told The Scotsman they had “worried many Ukrainains”.

She said: “This was a question that worried many Ukranians, but I was telling them ‘it’s not a Prime Minister who is supporting us, it's the British people who are supporting us’. And this is important to understand that everywhere where I travel in Scotland, central England, like everywhere, we hear the support from people, not only politicians, and this is important to always keep in mind.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was praised for his speech at the G20.

“So I do believe that Rishi Sunak will be supporting us at the scale, if not larger than previous prime ministers were. His G20 speech was above my expectations, because he was very strict. He called Putin a criminal and he called out Putin as a person who should have come and explained himself to the G20 leaders.

“He was very clear about what happened in Poland and so we were like looking at him thinking he may be a bigger supporter to us than even Boris Johnson and that would be fantastic.”

Ms Rudik spoke in the wake of the leaders of Poland and Nato declaring the missile that killed two people in Polish territory on Tuesday was likely fired by Ukrainian forces defending their country against a barrage of Russian strikes.

The Ukrainian MP, who was in Westminster meeting with the SNP’s Ian Blackford discussing additional generators for Ukraine, hailed the First Minister as “fantastic”.

She also accused Mr Putin of avoiding the summit in Bali, Indonesia, because he did not want to take “complicated questions”.

The 37-year old explained: "They care about the grains, about the food security crisis, and the question would be ‘why are you now allowing Ukrainian ships, why are you slowing them down?’

"There is no answer to that because Putin does not have an answer, because he is playing an upper hand that is not an upper hand, and he has to explain to Russians what is happening, and there is no good explanation.

"Then he would have to explain to the countries like India, Indonesia, China and Brazil, why he’s hurting their citizens to achieve some political victories.”

The vice-president of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, Ms Rudik said seeing other countries go about as normal when she visited didn’t upset her, but rather was motivation for what Ukraine would be again.

She said: “We are not looking at it as something that makes us angry, but something we are looking forward to coming back to. When I’m in Poland, it’s a country where I think we could have had that if we joined the EU earlier and it just makes me say ‘OK, well, we will work harder and push faster to get there’.

“We just want to return to normal life, drinking tea, walking around, talking, having fun, not having to go to the bombshell shelter when the air raid siren is on, not having to worry about having electricity tomorrow, not hiding food in your house, not having your backpack for a nuclear attack preparation."