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Boris Johnson has claimed he's "not someone who deprecates other countries and cultures", despite years of evidence to the contrary.

He's previously referred to black people as "piccaninnies", suggested the people of Papua New Guinea are cannibals, wrote a poem suggesting the Prime Minister of Turkey has sex with goats and compared burqa wearing women to letterboxes and bank robbers.

The bumbling Brexiteer was giving a speech widely seen as a brazen pitch for the Tory leadership.

In his address, he called for Brexit to be used as an opportunity to create 'cohesion' in Britain.

Explaining why he felt this was important, he insisted: "I’m not a nationalist if by that you mean I’m a xenophobe or someone who depricates other countries and cultures.

"Absolutely not, far from it. I’m called Boris, apart from anything else.

"My ancestors come from all over the place

"He paused, before muttering: “…all of this….anyway”.

(Image: REUTERS)

Mr Johnson has repeatedly sparked outrage over offensive comments about people from other countries and cultures.

Most recently, he compared Muslim who wear face veils to "letter boxes" and "bank robbers".

He described black people as “flag-waving piccaninnies” with “watermelon smiles” in a 2002 column for the Daily Telegraph.

He apologised six years later for the racial slurs, which he used to mock Tony Blair ’s travels across the globe.

In 2006 he was forced to apologise to the nation of Papua New Guinea, after writing in the Telegraph: "For 10 years we in the Tory Party have become used to Papua New Guinea-style orgies of cannibalism and chief-killing."

(Image: REUTERS)

Jean L Kekedo, Papua New Guinea's High Commissioner in London, was not happy, saying: "I consider the comments, coming from a senior British MP very damaging to the image of Papua New Guinea and an insult to the integrity and intelligence of all Papua New Guineans."

In May 2016, Mr Johnson was awarded £1,000 for winning a competition to write the best offensive poem about Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the President of Turkey.

In the poem, Mr Johnson implied President Erdoğan was fond of having sex with goats.

Elsewhere in his 'wide-ranging' speech, Johnson said it would be "shameful" for the UK Government to request an extension to the Article 50 process to delay Brexit beyond March 29.

"It would be shameful at this late stage to change that totemic date - March 29, the one fact to which the public has been able to cling with absolute certainty in this sea of political confusion," he said.

"All this vacuous talk of extending Article 50 is dishonest but it's also weakening our negotiating position once again."

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(Image: REUTERS)

Speaking at JCB headquarters in Staffordshire, Mr Johnson said it would be "absolutely preposterous" if a delay were to force the UK to spend money on elections to the European Parliament this spring, adding: "The public would have the strong and altogether justified impression of an elite conspiracy to thwart Brexit."

He said that calls to rule out a no-deal Brexit were "irrelevant" because it was "overwhelmingly likely that we will get a deal, we just won't get this deal".

He said the UK should remove the Irish backstop from Theresa May's plan but retain the proposed transition period to December 2020, using the period to negotiate a new free trade deal.

The UK should withhold half of its £39 billion financial settlement until the deal is completed, in order to "put a tiger in the tank" of the EU's willingness to make concessions.

Mr Johnson said he was confident that the EU27 would become more "flexible" in negotiations as the deadline for Brexit got nearer, as history showed that it was "only in the last few days and weeks of a negotiation that the big concessions are made".