LONDON—Britain’s ambassador to the U.S. said he is resigning after secret cables in which he criticized President Trump were leaked, causing a diplomatic firestorm.
“The current situation is making it impossible for me to carry out my role as I would like,” Kim Darroch wrote in a resignation letter. The decision to stand down follows a Twitter spat with the president that threatened to strain the relationship between the U.K. and U.S.
On Sunday, a U.K. newspaper published leaked diplomatic cables in which Mr. Darroch was highly critical of the U.S. president.
In one of the cables, Mr. Darroch described the Trump administration as dysfunctional, faction-ridden, diplomatically clumsy and inept.
Mr. Trump responded to the leaks in a series of Twitter posts in which he called Mr. Darroch “very stupid” and “wacky.” Mr. Trump said he would no longer work with the ambassador, who was excluded from an official dinner at the Treasury Department earlier in the week. The U.S. president also criticized Prime Minister Theresa May’s handling of the U.K.’s departure from the European Union.
In remarks to Parliament on Wednesday, Mrs. May said Mr. Darroch’s resignation was a matter of “deep regret.” Mr. Darroch, who was appointed in 2015, was due to step down at the end of the year but said he had no choice but to leave now. “I believe in the current circumstances the responsible course is to allow the appointment of a new ambassador,” Mr. Darroch wrote.
It is unprecedented for the head of a friendly state to refuse to cooperate with a sitting British ambassador, said Simon McDonald, permanent undersecretary at the U.K. Foreign Office, in testimony to a House of Commons panel. “Nothing like this has ever happened before, there must be consequences,” he said.
The timing of the resignation was a surprise but appeared almost inevitable after Boris Johnson, the likely next British prime minister, declined to back Mr. Darroch in a debate on Tuesday with Jeremy Hunt, the foreign secretary. The two are battling to become the leader of the Conservative Party as well as the country’s next prime minister.
Mr. Hunt had attacked Mr. Trump’s tweets. “Friends speak frankly so I will: these comments are disrespectful and wrong to our Prime Minister and my country,” he wrote on Twitter.
Mr. Johnson’s refusal to back the ambassador was criticized by Alan Duncan, a senior official in the Foreign Office. “He has basically thrown our top diplomat under the bus,” he said Wednesday. British officials had rallied round Mr. Darroch, arguing that his frank analysis of the Trump administration was part of his job. An inquiry into the source of the leak is under way.
Mr. Darroch’s decision illustrates the tightrope that the British government is walking as it seeks to leave the EU, a step that increases the importance of the close relationship with the U.S.
Mr. Trump in 2016 suggested that euroskeptic Nigel Farage would make a good U.S. ambassador, an idea that was quickly rejected by the U.K. government.
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Brexit supporters applauded the resignation. “The right decision, time [to] put in a non-Remainer who wants a trade deal with America,” tweeted Mr. Farage.
Mr. McDonald called a meeting Wednesday to urge British ambassadors to continue to share unvarnished views as before. The government declined to comment on whether Mrs. May would pick Mr. Darroch’s successor in her remaining two-week tenure.
Mr. Darroch built a reputation as a well-connected and energetic diplomat. He was, however, criticized for failing to spot Mr. Trump’s rise ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
Once Mr. Trump turned on him, his position quickly became difficult. The ambassador was disinvited from a dinner of Washington dignitaries Monday to honor Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, according to U.S. officials. He also recused himself from a meeting with Ivanka Trump on Tuesday.
Mr. Darroch represented the U.K. in Tokyo and Rome and at the 1995 Dayton Agreement negotiations that brought an end to the Bosnian war.
He served as Prime Minister David Cameron’s top national security adviser between 2012 and 2015, advising on issues such as the fight against Islamic State and Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
He also worked in Brussels as the U.K.’s top diplomat at the EU between 2007 and 2011—a posting that has tended to earn British civil servants the enmity of supporters of Brexit.
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Write to Max Colchester at max.colchester@wsj.com and Jason Douglas at jason.douglas@wsj.com
Corrections & Amplifications
Kim Darroch was excluded from a Treasury Department dinner this week. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said the dinner was at the White House. (July 10, 2019)
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https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-k-ambassador-to-u-s-to-resign-11562756578
2019-07-10 12:34:00Z
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