If Putin were a woman I'd invade her, confesses Boris

Boris Johnson is "powerfully attracted" to the idea of Vladimir Putin as a woman, an aide to the UK Prime Minister suggested today. 'Forget Ukraine, I'd be invading Vladimira! he was reputed to have muttered, applying a blonde wig filter to news photos of the Russian President on his phone while waiting to speak at a press conference at the NATO summit in Madrid.

'Boris was complaining that there aren't enough women at these summits,' said the aide, 'especially after the prime ministers of both Sweden and Finland refused his offer for "special negotiations". We've tried to spin this as appreciating women's roles as peacemakers, after all that's something that female leaders like Indira Gandhi and Margaret Thatcher were famous for.'

Rumours that a Tory donor has been approached to fund "an op" for Putin have been denied, but Downing Street refused to comment on reports that Mr Johnson recently made a Zoom call to Putin and opened it with the words "is that a tank in my pocket or am I pleased to see you?"

'Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours, like me' croons Putin

The cancellation of the Australian soap Neighbours is now thought to be the primary motivation for the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

An aide to Putin said 'Vlad is a huge fan of Neighbours. He used to watch it twice a day, but he preferred it in the 1980s, much like the Soviet Union. He always used to sing along with the theme tune, you know, Neighbours... everybody needs good neighbours - like Russia! The show warmed the cockles of where his heart should be. Now it's being cancelled, he no longer believes good neighbours become good friends so the only possible alternative is invasion and the accompanying indiscriminate slaughter. Anyway who said nuclear war? Not me! Why are you always going on about nuclear war?'

Image: Pixabay/Pexels

Classic Russian Playbook' banned from children's libraries after invasion of Ukraine

Children's libraries across Europe are refusing to stock the 'Classic Russian Playbook' after it became clear that Putin was using it to plan and execute a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

"The American President and others have been saying for weeks that Putin's invasion of Ukraine was following the 'Classic Russian Playbook", said the head of the UK Librarian's Association today.

"At first, we found it very difficult to believe that Russia would use a children's book as the focus of an invasion plan, but when we checked the contents, we were quite shocked."

Extracts from the book include:

'This is Vladimir.'

'Vladimir is scared.'

'Vladimir likes playing pretend.'

'Vladimir sits at a very, very long table.'

'Vladimir has surrounded a friendly country with tanks and missiles to the north, east and south.'

'Vladimir pretends to support separatist regions as a pretext for invasion.'

The EU's chief of libraries is withdrawing the book immediately as a precaution against 'giving any other kids ideas.'