Keir Starmer unable to return to UK with gift from President Erdogan at NATO summit
There's shooting the breeze, but Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's gift to Sir Keir Starmer has taken cordial affairs to a whole new level.
The world's leaders have travelled to Ankara, the capital of Turkey, this week for the NATO summit.
Never one to miss an opportunity to stir things up, Donald Trump once again laid claim to the Danish territory of Greenland on Wednesday, 8 July, which no doubt went down very well with his NATO allies - Denmark included.
The US president may have a knack of getting his own way when it comes to getting red cards overturned for World Cup games, but green lands are a much thornier issue.
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There was some thawing of international relations, though, as Trump met with Turkey president Erdoğan on Tuesday and said his country would lift sanctions on the nation.
During the meeting at the presidential palace, Trump said: "We're going to be taking the sanctions off, okay?" He added that Cabinet officials were already working on the move. Earlier, he also said selling F-35 fighter jets to Turkey was "certainly something we will consider."
That must have left Erdoğan in quite a happy mood, as he has been handing out gifts to the heads of state visiting his country, Sir Keir Starmer included, even if it is one the Prime Minister can't bring back to the United Kingdom.
Starmer has to leave his present in Turkey
In a shower of gifts presented to the leader of each country attending the NATO summit, Erdoğan gave Starmer the unlikely gift of a gun.
One that actually works, too!
In fact, the present was a personalised revolver with Starmer's name engraved upon it.
The firearm even came with live ammunition but the soon-to-be-departed Prime Minister has not been able to bring it back home to Downing Street with him.
Though Erdoğan waived export controls on the present, it is illegal to import a live firearm into the UK so Starmer has had to leave it behind in Turkey.
The BBC reports it has remained with British officials in Ankara and will be decommissioned so it is no longer able to fire bullets.
An image of the revolver has not been released.
Like Trump - who bizarrely has his poo flown back to the US during the summit - Starmer also reached an agreement with Erdoğan, his involving intelligence sharing between the two countries.
"This has been a good summit. We achieved what we wanted to achieve, which is unity," he said.
"So important we have that, particularly with the conflicts going on in Ukraine and the conflicts in Iran."
The summit has been Starmer's final international event as Prime Minister after resigning last month, with Andy Burnham expected to take over at No.10 on July 20 - the day after the World Cup final.
Starmer appears to be going out with a bang - though not from a revolver, obviously - as he has strongly hinted a bank holiday could be on the horizon if England end 60 years of hurt and win the tournament.
"On the question of a bank holiday, I think I don't want to jinx it, but ask me again if we get to the final," he said.
However, the bank holiday is expected to be on the Friday following the final - July 24 - rather than the Monday immediately following.
England have to get past Norway in the quarter-finals on Saturday, 11 July, and then a semi-final before they can even think about winning the final, though.
Keir Starmer’s road to resignation: a timeline
Starmer’s premiership has been controversial from the off, in a government rife with U-turns on issues like the two-child benefit cap and pensioners’ winter fuel allowance.
But this is when the writing was truly on the wall for Starmer:
20 December 2024
Starmer appoints Peter Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to the US, a decision he will come to regret.
28 January 2025
We didn’t know this at the time, but on this date, UK Security Vetting (UKSV) advises that Mandelson should be denied security clearance. The following day, the Foreign Office decides to ignore UKSV’s guidance.
1 July 2025
Starmer is forced into a significant U-turn on plans to cut welfare payments, and 49 MPs still vote against the amended bill. It’s the biggest rebellion of Starmer’s premiership, and exposes tensions between Labour MPs and No 10 which aren’t going to go away.
10 September 2025
Bloomberg publishes emails from Mandelson to Jeffrey Epstein advising him to ‘fight for early release’, sent in 2008, the day before he reported to jail after being convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor.
11 September 2025
Mandelson is sacked as US ambassador. That month, the Labour Party conference is dominated by rumours that Manchester mayor Andy Burnham is looking to mount a leadership challenge.
25 January 2026
Burnham is blocked from standing as an MP in the Gorton and Denton by-election, leading to further unrest within the Labour Party
30 January 2026
The US government releases the largest tranche of documents relating to Epstein so far. Emails within the files suggest Mandelson passed on sensitive government information to Epstein, and lobbied the Treasury on his behalf during his tenure as business secretary in Gordon Brown’s government. Labour MPs are furious about the revelations.
23 February 2026
Mandelson is arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office.
7 May 2026
A disastrous polling day for Labour, the worst local elections result for the party on record, losing almost 1,500 councillors in England, with Reform making huge gains.
9 May 2026
Labour MP Catherine West demands that a cabinet minister challenge Starmer for the leadership, or she will herself. She later backs down.
11 May 2026
It’s widely reported that four senior cabinet ministers, including Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood and Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper, are telling Starmer to set out a timeline for his departure. Meanwhile, nearly 80 Labour MPs are thought to have signed Catherine West’s letter demanding Starmer resign. Starmer delivers a speech saying he’s ‘not walking away’, while admitting: “The British people are tired of a status quo that has failed them.”
12 May 2026
Four ministers - Jess Phillips, Miatta Fahnbulleh, Alex Davies-Jones and Zubir Ahmed - resign and call for Starmer to step down.
13 May 2026
Health Secretary Wes Streeting attends a meeting at Downing Street, which lasts just 20 minutes. His allies expect him to resign and launch a leadership contest.
14 May 2026
Streeting quits and calls for Starmer to resign. In his resignation letter, Streeting writes: “It is now clear that you will not lead the Labour Party into the next general election and that Labour MPs and Labour Unions want the debate about what comes next to be a battle of ideas, not of personalities or petty factionalism.
“It needs to be broad, and it needs to be the best possible field of candidates. I support that approach and I hope you will continue to facilitate it.”
Makerfield MP Josh Simons stands down so Burnham can ‘fight to re-enter Parliament’.
Mid-late May 2026
Leadership speculation intensifies as attention turns to Starmer's potential successors, including Andy Burnham, and other senior Labour figures.
17 June
Speaking at the G7 summit in Evian, Starmer says he ‘intends to fight in any challenge to my leadership’.
He tells the BBC: “I don't think there should be a challenge, because I think that is a bad thing for the country.”
19 June
Burnham wins the Makerfield by-election and becomes an MP again. He says he will set out a ‘new path for Britain’.
Starmer congratulates Burnham but urges Labour to ‘pull together’ and avoid ‘turning on each other and tearing apart our party’. Starmer says that he ‘will stand’ if a leadership contest is triggered, adding that he will not ‘walk away’.
According to the BBC, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander advises the PM to set out a timetable to leave office.
Labour MP Jo White says Starmer should ‘consider his position very, very carefully’ and announce a ‘smooth transition’ on Monday (22 June).
21 June
US President Donald Trump chimes in and says Starmer ‘will resign’ in a post on Truth Social.
“He failed badly on two very important subjects - IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!),” he writes. As per the BBC, No. 10 says Starmer has not spoken to Trump.
22 June
Starmer announces his resignation as Prime Minister and leader of the Labour Party. Standing outside No 10, he says that becoming PM two years ago had been the ‘proudest moment of his life’ and talks about the ‘hard work of change’, listing off some of the achievements of his government during that time.
Topics: Keir Starmer, UK News, World News
Daniel Murphy