The former Labour foreign secretary David Owen has said Keir Starmer is "wrong" to suggest Putin be put on trial at The Hague.

When asked whether he agrees with Keir Starmer, Lord Owen told Matt Chorley on Times Radio:

"I'm pretty wary of that. Firstly, it's not going to happen unless Russia is beaten, and Russia is not going to be beaten. I think it's the wrong language to use, quite frankly. We are not going to destroy Russia, so much so that they will offer up to The Hague. We're not going to send the SAS into Russia to seize Putin and take him to the Hague. A lot of these legal solutions, it's perhaps no accident that Starmer is a lawyer.

"We were able to do it in the Balkans which I know very well because we got a resolution through in the UN and we had support for international action and we had the special court that we set up to try war crimes committed in Yugoslavia, carried by the UN. We're not going to get that in Russia."

On whether the UK should send fighter jets to Ukraine, Lord Owen said:

"I personally think the best offer would be to go back to what was thought about, namely, let the MIGs in Poland go to the Ukrainians, and put our aircraft into Poland. That would be very quick.

"A new plane that they are not used to is not going to be that. What they need now is more MIGs. Their pilots fly MIGs, they could do it immediately. And Poland is ready to do it. But they can't give up all their aircraft themselves. They have to have replacements, so Britain could step in and supply aircraft to Poland."

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