Keir Starmer told Nigel Farage to stop “fawning over Putin” as the pair clashed over the Ukraine crisis.
The prime minister was responding to a Commons question from the Reform UK leader about how many British troops may be needed to keep the peace if a deal to end the war is agreed.
Donald Trump wants Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy to sign a deal which would give America access to his country’s natural resources in return for some military support.
Zelenskyy was due to sign the deal last Friday before his spectacular bust-up with Trump in the Oval Office.
In the Commons, Farage asked the PM: “President Zelenskyy has now accepted that he’s going to sign the minerals agreement with America, and America’s going to put in $100 billion or whatever it is and thousands of Americans will be in Ukraine.
“Is that of itself enough of a security guarantee or does it mean that we need to send British troops? If we do, given the size of our army, how many?”
Starmer replied: “The mineral deal is not enough on its own. But can I just remind him Russia is the aggressor. Zelenskyy is a war leader whose country has been invaded. We should all be supporting him and not fawning over [Vladimir] Putin.”
Farage was criticised earlier today after he blamed Zelenskyy for the Oval Office row, which saw Trump and vice-president JD Vance accuse him of not being grateful enough for the military support Ukraine has had from the US.
He told LBC: “I think President Zelenskyy was very unwise to tell the Americans what would happen to them if they didn’t back him. Yeah sure, Trump and Vance bit back, but I think in diplomatic terms, Zelenskyy played it very badly.”
Shadow foreign secretary Priti Patel said Farage was “completely wrong”.
Posting on X, she said: “President Zelenskyy is a hero, who has stood up to Putin’s aggression and led his country’s defence against their barbaric and illegal invasion over the last 3 years - and it is troubling to not hear the leader of Reform say that.”
Asked by GQ magazine in 2014 which world leader he admired, Farage said: “As an operator, but not as a human being, I would say Putin.”
And during last year’s election campaign, the Reform UK leader came in for major criticism when he told the BBC’s Nick Robinson that the West had “provoked” Russia into invading its neighbour through the eastward expansion of Nato and the European Union.