Liz Truss refuses to say if Donald Trump is ‘friend or foe’

Foreign secretary angered Emmanuel Macron by suggesting ‘jury is out’ on French president

Liz Truss has refused to say whether Donald Trump is a “friend or foe”, after sparking a diplomatic incident by suggesting that “the jury is out” on which camp French president Emmanuel Macron sits in.

Following her comment at a Conservative leadership hustings last week, Mr Macron warned she could cause “serious problems” in the Anglo-French relationship, insisting that he regarded the UK as a friend “regardless of its leaders, and sometimes in spite of its leaders”.

At the final hustings of the campaign to succeed Boris Johnson, in Wembley on Wednesday, Ms Truss chose her words more diplomatically.