EU chief rues failure to enter Brexit campaign

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker says one of his biggest mistakes in office was failing to get involved in the Brexit referendum campaign and counter what he says were the lies spread.

Juncker told reporters that he stayed out of the June 23, 2016 vote at the request of then prime minister, David Cameron, and that his mistake had been “to listen too carefully” to the premier.

Juncker says “it was a mistake not to intervene and not to interfere, because we would have been the only ones to destroy the lies which were circulated around.”

Juncker, whose term of office runs out at the end of October, said: “I was wrong to be silent.”