Promise To Be Ukraine's Best Friend If Elected As British PM, Liz Truss: I Will Make Sure Putin Fails And Loses In Ukraine

Liz Truss. (Wikimedia Commons/Policy Exchange)

JAKARTA - Foreign Minister Liz Truss, the front-runner to replace British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, said she would be Ukraine's "best friend" if she won the post, saying she would call Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky soon.

Truss, who as foreign minister has overseen the imposition of sanctions on those closest to Russian President Vladimir Putin, said she would work with allies to provide more arms and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

"As prime minister I will be Ukraine's best friend, following in the footsteps of Boris Johnson, fully committed to ensuring (Russian President Vladimir) Putin fails in Ukraine and suffers a strategic defeat, and that Russia is constrained in the future," Truss said in a statement, as reported by Reuters 28 July.

"This conflict is in the balance, and now is not the time to speak of concessions and compromises to a terrible dictator. I am the candidate the British people can trust in Ukraine, and whom they can trust to defend our freedoms at home and abroad".

Truss is competing to become the new prime minister against former finance minister Rishi Sunak in a leadership contest that has been marked by clashes over the timing of tax cuts, as well as more personal attacks.

Truss leads in the polls among members of the Conservative Party, who will ultimately decide who will be Britain's next prime minister after weeks of voting on September 5.

As for Boris Johnson, who was forced to announce his resignation from the position of prime minister earlier this month by an uprising in his Conservative Party over a series of scandals, he has been a vocal supporter of Ukraine since Russia's invasion in February. He had traveled twice to the Kyiv capital to meet Zelensky.