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The UK's attorney general, Richard Hermer, has called on Nigel Farage to apologise to school contemporaries who assert he targeted with racist abuse them during their years in education.

Hermer said that Farage had "undoubtedly deeply hurt" many people, judging by their accounts of his actions as a youth. He commented that the leader's "evolving" statements had been unconvincing.

“In his answers to legitimate questions, not once has Farage actually condemned antisemitism,” Hermer stated to a publication.

New Allegations Come to Light

A recent investigation last month documented the statements of over a dozen one-time schoolmates of Farage from Dulwich College.

One, a former pupil, said that a teenage Farage "would approach me and say: ‘Hitler was right’ or ‘gas them’, sometimes adding a long hiss to imitate the sound of the Nazi gas chambers”.

Another student of colour claimed that when he was roughly nine years old, he was subjected to similar treatment by a 17-year-old Farage.

“He came over to a pupil flanked by two equally tall mates and spoke to anyone looking ‘other’,” the individual said. “That included me on three occasions; questioning me where I was from, and motioning, saying: ‘Go back that way,’ to wherever you answered you were from.”

After the story broke, others have come forward; around two dozen people have now alleged they were either targets of or saw deeply offensive conduct by Farage.

The incidents they recounted relate to the period when Farage was aged 13 to 18.

Evolving Explanations

The Reform leader has disputed that anything he did was "explicitly" racist or antisemitic, and has asserted the former classmates were misremembering.

Commentators have pointed out that Farage has failed to condemn antisemitism and other forms of racism outright in his responses.

They also reference his failure to discipline a party member, a MP, after she complained about the number of people of colour she saw in television commercials. She later apologised for the statements.

“Nigel Farage’s evolving narrative about his behaviour to his peers [is] not credible, to say the least,” Hermer commented.

He continued: “Claiming that a group of people have all recalled incorrectly the same things about his offensive behaviour simply lacks credibility."

Call for Leadership

“If he aspires to be seen as a credible figure for the top job, he urgently needs address the anxieties of the Jewish community, and say sorry to the many people he has clearly deeply hurt by his behaviour,” Hermer stated.

“Racism in all its forms is anathema to the standards of this country and we must not permit it to ever become accepted in politics.”

In a other comments, the Chancellor said Farage should “speak out” if he wanted to be considered a real leader.

“It says a lot how very little he has to say, and the precisely drafted words that both you and I would identify as being drafted in a certain style to say something, but also dodge the issue,” she remarked.

Legal Letters and Later Statements

In legal letters prior to the release of the report, Farage’s legal team stated that “the implication that Mr Farage ever was involved in, condoned, or led this behaviour is categorically denied”.

Farage later seemingly shifted his position in an interview, remarking: “Did I say things decades ago that you could interpret as being teenage humour, you could interpret in a modern light today in some sort of way? Perhaps.”

He commented that he had “never directly sought to go and hurt anybody”. Farage subsequently put out a further comment: “I can tell you categorically that I did not say the things that have been printed as a 13-year-old, so long ago.”