London mayor draws line under Trump feud

LONDON:

London Mayor Sadiq Khan on Tuesday followed other prominent politicians from Britain's ruling Labour party by drawing a line under his previous outspoken criticism of US president-elect Donald Trump.

Khan -- one of Britain's most high-profile Asian-origin politi-cians, speaking a day after it was revealed he had been knighted by King Charles III -- told AFP in an interview the American people had "spoken loudly and clearly".

"As somebody who believes in democracy, who believes in elections, I think we have got to respect the outcome of the presidential elections...

"The American people have chosen Donald Trump to be their president," he said.

Khan, 54, the son of Pakistani immigrants to Britain, be-came embroiled in an extraordinary war of words with Trump during the Republican's first presidency.

That was sparked by Khan speaking out against a US travel ban on people from certain Muslim countries.

Trump then accused Khan -- the first Muslim mayor of a Western capital when he was first elected in 2016 -- of do-ing a "very bad job on terrorism", calling him a "stone cold loser" and "very dumb".

The mayor in turn allowed an unflattering blimp of Trump dressed as a baby in nappies to fly above protests in central London during his 2018 visit to Britain.

More recently, in a podcast recorded before Trump's re-election on November 5 and released in mid-November, Khan accused him of targeting him because of the colour of his skin.

"He's come for me because of, let's be frank, my ethnicity and my religion," he said.

But, in his latest comments, Khan fell into line with other leading members of the UK's new Labour government, elected in July, in appearing to seek a reset.

"As somebody who is a proud patriot, (I'm) looking forward to this special relationship continuing. Let's wait and see what sort of president Donald Trump is," he said, adding that the soon-to-be commander-in-chief had received his "best wishes".

"I look forward to America and UK prospering together, be-cause it's really important for the world to see a US that's successful," he added.

Several Labour MPs now in senior government posts, in-cluding Foreign Secretary David Lammy, were critical of Trump while they were in opposition during his first White House term.

In 2018, Lammy labelled him a "woman-hating, neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath". But Britain's now-top diplomat in November dismissed the remarks as "old news".