New Zealand sacks ambassador to UK after he questions Trump s grasp of history

SYDNEY - New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters said on March 6 that he had sacked the country’s ambassador to the UK, after he made comments seen as critical of US President Donald Trump.

Mr Phil Goff made the comments at a forum in London on March 4 that appeared to question Mr Trump’s grasp of history, contrasting the US President’s attempts to thaw relations with Russia with the actions of Britain’s wartime leader Winston Churchill, who fought against Nazi Germany.

“President Trump has restored the bust of Churchill to the Oval Office. But do you think he really understands history?” Mr Goff asked during a panel with Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen.

Mr Peters said in a statement on March 6 that Mr Goff’s comments were “deeply disappointing”.

“They do not represent the views of the NZ government and make his position as High Commissioner to London untenable,” he said.

Mr Goff did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment via his X account outside of UK business hours.

Mr Bede Corry, New Zealand’s top government bureaucrat in the Foreign Ministry, was working with Mr Goff on a transition to a new ambassador, he added.

Mr Goff, a former foreign minister and lawmaker in the centre-left Labour Party, was appointed ambassador to the UK in 2023.

Mr Peters leads the populist NZ First party in the current right-leaning coalition governing New Zealand. REUTERS

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