The UK’s foreign secretary backed her American counterpart in playing down reports that Britain has stopped sharing intelligence with the US about suspected drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean.
Yvette Cooper also appeared to voice support for Donald Trump’s concerns about drug cartels in Venezuela, though she stopped short of endorsing potential military action against the government of Nicolas Maduro.
Any decision by the US president to launch attacks against Venezuela would cause a dilemma for the UK because a small number of British military personnel are serving aboard a US aircraft carrier and at least one of its escorting warships that is in the Caribbean Sea.
John Healey, the defence secretary, said British service personnel would always act within international humanitarian law. However, he would not be drawn on offering a view on any possible US assault on Venezuela, saying he did not want to comment on hypotheticals.
The two senior members of Sir Keir Starmer’s cabinet were talking as they visited HMS Prince of Wales, one of the UK’s two aircraft carriers, which is off the coast of Naples, and on the way back from a near eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific.
Ms Cooper was asked to comment on informed reports that the UK had halted intelligence sharing with the US related to suspected Caribbean drug traffickers because it did not want to be complicit in potentially illegal military strikes against them.
She referred to “long-standing” intelligence and law enforcement frameworks between the UK and its five eyes partners, the US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
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“Those frameworks continue. That is why intelligence sharing as part of those frameworks of course continues,” she said.
Ms Cooper then pointed to remarks by Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, who last week rejected a report by CNN on the intelligence sharing rift between the US and the UK as “a false story”.
The British foreign secretary said: “As you know we don’t comment on the detail of intelligence matters but I think you will probably have seen the US secretary of state has dismissed some of the reports that there have been.”
Would the UK support action against Venezuela?
Asked what the UK position is regarding potential US military action against Venezuela, she said: “There are issues in terms of stability in Venezuela and support for democracy in Venezuela. There is also issues right across the area around the scale of the criminal drug gang networks and some of the serious threats that we have seen in terms of criminal threats. As well as issues around state stability.”
The foreign secretary said the UK was discussing these issues with the US and other international partners.
Pressed on whether that meant Britain would support military action by the US, she said: “We will continue to have international discussions.”
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A small number of British military personnel – single digits – are understood to be deployed on USS Gerald R Ford, a giant US aircraft carrier, and other warships that form part of the carrier strike group that has been sent towards Venezuela.
The defence secretary was asked whether these British personnel would be allowed to take part in any US attack on the country.
He said: “We will make sure as we always do that our British military are consistent with international humanitarian law.
“In terms of military and intelligence operations and sharing with the US, they are out closest security defence and intelligence partner and they will remain so.”
