During a 2019 radio interview, Mr Johnson said investigating historic child sexual abuse was a waste of money, infamously declaring police budgets had been “spaffed up the wall”
Boris Johnson has called for all the “powerful men” who visited Jeffrey Epstein’s island to give evidence about the dead paedophile.
Appearing on Swedish television, the former PM was asked how he’d managed to avoid the sex offender and financier. “Search me, Guv,” he quipped.
But he called for more people to “explain what they knew.”
It comes as the US Congress invited Peter Mandelson to testify before the House Oversight Committee’s Epstein probe. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has also been invited to give evidence – but Congress has no legal power to force either man to appear.
Mr Johnson said: “One thing I will say about the whole thing, I do think it’s really curious that after all this time – Epstein obviously died in jail, but there’s only one person who’s in prison, and that’s a woman.
“And all these men, all these powerful men who’ve been on this island or whatever, none of them have given evidence. And they should. They should explain what they knew. And I think we’re squeamish about it because it’s such a horrible subject, but these people need to say, the Andrew formerly known as Prince, Bill Gates, all these guys. Get them to testify.
“The Clintons, whatever.”
During a 2019 radio interview, Mr Johnson said investigating historic child sexual abuse was a waste of money, infamously declaring police budgets had been “spaffed up the wall”.
Asked on Swedish TV if he was ever invited to the island, Johnson said: “No. Absolutely not, no. I don’t appear in any way in any of this stuff.”
While it’s true that Mr Johnson was not in communication with Epstein, according to the files, his name does come up a number of times in conversations between the paedophile financier and former Trump aide Steve Bannon, as they discuss both Brexit and Johnson’s move to depose Theresa May as Prime Minister.
In a letter sent to Peter Mandelson today, House Democrats Suhas Subramanyam and Robert Garcia say they believe he could hold “critical information” on Epstein’s co-conspirators.
“While you no longer serve as British ambassador to the United States and have stepped down from the House of Lords, it is clear that you possessed extensive social and business ties to Jeffrey Epstein and hold critical information pertaining to our investigation of Epstein’s operations,” the letter reads.
“Given the appalling allegations regarding Epstein’s conduct, we request that you make yourself available for a transcribed interview with committee staff regarding the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirators.”
The letter gives Mandelson two weeks to respond.
In a statement following his sacking as Ambassador to the US last year, Lord Mandelson said: “I was wrong to believe Epstein following his conviction and to continue my association with him afterwards. I apologise unequivocally for doing so to the women and girls who suffered. I was never culpable or complicit in his crimes. Like everyone else I learned the actual truth about him after his death. But his victims did know what he was doing, their voices were not heard and I am sorry I was amongst those who believed him over them.”
It comes over a week after the UK Government voted to publish all material relating to Lord Mandelson’s appointment in 2024, with information relating to national security and foreign relations being vetted by Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).
Mandelson, 72, is facing a criminal investigation into allegations he passed market-sensitive information to billionaire predator Epstein while serving as business secretary in Gordon Brown’s government during the 2008 financial crash. No10 said the Cabinet Office had passed material to the Metropolitan Police after a review of the Epstein files released by the US Department of Justice.