Nigel Farage said the West “provoked” Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by expanding the European Union and NATO military alliance eastward.
The UK’s reformist leader told the BBC that “of course” the war was President Vladimir Putinfault.
But he added that the expansion of the EU and NATO gave him a “reason” to tell the Russian people “they are coming after us again”.
In an interview with BBC’s Nick Robinson, Farage was questioned about his judgment and past statements, including when he named Russian President Vladimir Putin as the world leader he most admired in 2014.
“I said I didn’t like him as a person, but I admired him as a political operator because he managed to take control of the management of Russia,” Farage said.
He was then pressed a social media post in February 2022when he stated that the Russian invasion of Ukraine was “a consequence of the expansion of the EU and NATO”.
Farage said he had been arguing since the 1990s that “the ever-increasing eastward expansion” of the NATO and EU military alliance was giving President Putin “a reason to [give to] their Russian people to say that they are coming for us again and that they are going to war.”
He added: “We provoked this war. Of course, it is [President Putin’s] lack.”
Responding to the interview, Conservative Home Secretary James Cleverly said Farage was “repeating Putin’s vile justification for the brutal invasion of Ukraine”.
Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It followed the occupation of the Crimea and Donbas regions in 2014.
Ukraine is not a member of the EU or NATO, which is made up of 32 countries in Europe and North America.
However, the country applied to join both blocs after the Russian invasion.
NATO was formed in 1949 by 12 countries, including the US, UK, Canada and France.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, many Eastern European countries joined, including Hungary, Poland and Estonia.
The EU has also expanded since the 1990s, with several Eastern European countries joining in 2004.
In the interview, Farage also accused the Conservatives of failing to deliver on Brexit.
As leader of UKIP, he was a key figure in the campaign to leave the EU.
Although the issue dominated the 2019 general election, with Boris Johnson campaigning under the slogan “Get Brexit Done”, it has not featured prominently in the current campaign.
Asked whether he stood by his previous claim that Brexit had failed, Farage said: “No, it is not a failure, but we have failed to deliver.
“It cannot be a failure. We have left the European Union. We are now self-governing.”
But he added: “Brexit failed those who voted for it, believing immigration numbers would be reduced.”
Net migration – the difference between the number of people coming to live in the UK and those leaving – has risen sharply since 2021, when the UK left the EU.
This was driven by third country nationals coming to the UK.
Net migration reached record levels in 2022, before reducing slightly the following year.
Reform UK said it supports a freeze on non-essential immigration to ease pressure on housing and public services, increase wages and “protect our culture, identity and values”.
Farage also criticized the Conservatives for “binning” his promise to repeal 4,000 EU laws.
Pressed on whether he was just blaming others, Farage said: “If you put me in charge it would be very, very different. Of course they didn’t do that.
“The Conservative Party never believed in Brexit… They took it as a political opportunity and failed to deliver.”
Farage also faced questions about his stance on climate change and whether he believed it was not really a “crisis”.
“I think since the late 1980s maybe there’s been a little bit of enthusiasm around this, and I think that’s maybe wrong,” he said.
“We only talk about fear, not solutions.”
He added: “We spend too much time hyperventilating about the problem rather than thinking practically and logically about what we can do.”
Farage called Labour’s and the Conservatives’ net zero emissions policies “absurd”, claiming that £30 billion a year could be saved if their climate commitments were abandoned.
He was also asked about the Reformation’s verification procedures after the party withdrew a number of potential parliamentary candidates due to inappropriate or offensive comments.
The party blamed a company it hired to carry out background checks on potential candidates, claiming it did not carry out the check before the election was called.
Asked why some people with extremist views seemed to support his cause, Farage said: “They’re not there because of me.”
Despite being a co-founder of the party and being its honorary president, he insisted: “I have not had any involvement in the day-to-day management of the party for more than three years.
“These candidates were recruited before I said I was going to play an active role in the party.”
Farage replaced Richard Tice as reform leader in just the second full week of the election campaign.
At the same time he announced he would stand as a candidate in Clacton after previously saying he would not run in the July elections.
The BBC is interviewing key party leaders ahead of the election in The Panorama Interviews with Nick Robinson. You can watch the interview with Nigel Farage at 7pm on BBC One or BBC iPlayer.
You can find a full list of candidates in the Clacton constituency here.
