Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Boris Johnson apologises for his Iranian blunder

Boris Johnson had to be summoned to the Commons by an urgent question from Labour, but when he got there, he did eventually apologise for his blunder in which he had told MPs that Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe had been visiting Iran in a professional capacity to teach journalism. The Foreign Secretary was in far less bullish a mood than he was a week ago when he answered questions on the matter, telling MPs that: ‘I apologise to Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her family if I had inadvertently caused them any further anguish’; he later added: ‘I do apologise, I do apologise and of course I retract any suggestion that she was there in a professional capacity’.

“My comments should have been clearer and I apologise” says @BorisJohnson after his mistake caused greater despair for Zaghari-Ratcliffe pic.twitter.com/fu0zVjf4Jt — Sky News (@SkyNews) November 13, 2017

He took a while, though, to respond fully to demands from Labour MPs to admit that he got it wrong, merely arguing ‘that was my mistake: I should have been clearer’, before later telling Kevin Brennan that he was ‘wrong’ to have said what he did.

James has previously pointed out on Coffee

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