U.K. ambassador, in leaked remarks, said the "one country" with a "special relationship" with the U.S. is "probably Israel"
Britain's Ambassador to the U.S., Sir Christian Turner, said in February, before the U.S. and Israel launched their joint war with Iran, that to him it seemed the "only country" to have a "special relationship" with the United States was "probably Israel."
Turner made the remarks to a group of British high-school age students visiting the U.S. A recording of the comments was obtained by the Financial Times and reported by the newspaper on Tuesday.
Turner also told the students he considered it "extraordinary" that the scandal over the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein had "brought down a senior member of the royal family [Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor], a British ambassador to Washington [Peter Mandelson], potentially the prime minister [Keir Starmer], and yet here in the U.S., it really hasn't touched anybody."
Turner said that he didn't like the term "special relationship," coined by Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the wake of World War II, to describe the U.S.-U.K. bond, calling it "quite nostalgic" and "backwards-looking," according to the FT.
"I think there is probably one country that has a special relationship with the United States," he said, "and that is probably Israel."
CBS News has not reviewed the audio of his remarks, but the British government has not denied their authenticity.
In a statement to CBS News, the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office said Turner's remarks were "private, informal comments made to a group of U.K. sixth-form students visiting the U.S. in early February. They are certainly not any reflection of the UK Government's position."
Turner did tell the students, who would have been mostly 16 and 17 years old in that grade level, that U.K.-U.S. ties were "so strong," citing "a deep history and affinity between us. Particularly on defense and security, we are intertwined."
His private remarks were made public as King Charles III and Queen Camila paid a formal state visit to the U.S., being welcomed at the White House by President Trump ahead of an address by the monarch to a joint session of the U.S. Congress.
The royal visit has been seen widely as a bid by the U.K. government to ease transatlantic ties, after Mr. Trump's repeated bashing of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, whom the American leader has accused of failing to support the Iran war effort.
Starmer has also been fighting domestic calls for his resignation by political opponents over his decision to appoint Turner's predecessor, Peter Mandelson — a friend of Epstein's — to the ambassadorship.
Starmer fired Mandelson — a mainstay of Starmer's own Labour Party since the 1990s — from the ambassadorship in September, soon after details of the depth of his friendship with Epstein emerged in the infamous files released in Washington.
Mr. Trump weighed in on the matter last week, predicting that Starmer can "recover" from the scandal.