When ambassadors are the real thing

The self-serving and manipulative Boris Johnson has gone to Burma with a view to creating a bit of an incident. As he began reciting Rudyard Kipling’s poem Mandalay, the British ambassador stopped him, reminding him he was on mike and saying “No, not a good idea.”

Fortunately, British ambassadors are career diplomats and well-educated, so this particular ambassador recognised the poem immediately and was able to stop his Foreign Secretary making a calculated insult. I can’t think of many Maltese ambassadors who would have been able to do either of those things.