TOKYO/LONDON, April 20 (Reuters) – British foreign minister Yvette Cooper will cut short an intensive diplomatic tour designed to build consensus around making a ceasefire in the Iran war permanent and on the next steps to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Cooper’s department is at the centre of a new crisis over Peter Mandelson’s appointment as Britain’s ambassador to the United States, after the government last week said foreign office officials had overruled a recommendation that he should not be given the role.
That revelation led to new calls from political opponents for Prime Minister Keir Starmer to resign. Starmer says he was not told of the initial vetting recommendation and is due to speak to parliament on the matter later on Monday.
Against that backdrop, Cooper will return to London early from the Japan leg of her trip after meetings on Monday, cancelling a scheduled speech in Tokyo on Tuesday and skipping a planned return to the Gulf.
The foreign office did not give a reason for the change to her itinerary.
Cooper has been on the road since last week, meeting allies in Paris, Antalya, Dubai and Tokyo.
The top official in her department, Olly Robbins, was sacked last week after Starmer and Cooper lost confidence in him over what Downing Street said was his decision to overturn the vetting recommendation that Mandelson should not be cleared.
Robbins is expected to appear before a parliamentary committee on Tuesday. That comes after allies spoke out publicly to say he had been treated harshly by ministers.
(Reporting by William James in London and Tim Kelly in Tokyo, editing by Elizabeth Piper and Hugh Lawson)
Comments