Russian ambassador: Johnson's fall is just reward for 'belligerent' policy on Ukraine

LONDON, July 7 (Reuters) - Russia's ambassador to Britain said on Thursday that Boris Johnson's fall was a just reward for a "belligerent" anti-Russian policy of support for Ukraine while ignoring the economic needs of the British people.

"He concentrated too much on the geopolitical situation, on Ukraine," Andrei Kelin, Russian ambassador to Britain, told Reuters in an interview in London.

"He left behind very much the country, people, state of the economy, and this is what has brought this outcome," Kelin said in English. "Of course, we would prefer someone who is not so antagonistic or belligerent."

Johnson, the face of the 2016 Brexit campaign who won a resounding electoral victory in 2019 before leading the United Kingdom out of the European Union, announced he was quitting on Thursday after he was abandoned by ministers and most of his Conservative lawmakers over a series of scandals. (Reporting by Jake Cordell; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)