<p class="bodytext">Boris Johnson is intimately familiar with Brussels. Now he is leading Britain definitively out of the European project, armed with a trade deal four-and-a-half years after launching the biggest gamble of his career.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The Conservative prime minister spent part of his childhood in the EU capital, where his father Stanley worked for the European Commission, and lived there again as a journalist in the 1990s when he was given to tall tales about bureaucratic skullduggery.</p>.<p class="bodytext">It was perhaps understandable if he felt torn about which way to leap in Britain's 2016 Brexit referendum, famously drawing up a list of pros and cons for EU membership before throwing his considerable political charisma behind the "leave" campaign.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson's sway, and propensity for exaggeration, helped swing the bitterly divisive campaign and he intervened last year to end the subsequent political paralysis by seizing control of the Conservative party.</p>.<p class="bodytext"><strong>Also Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/international/world-news-politics/uk-eu-finalise-historic-post-brexit-trade-accord-931134.html">UK, EU finalise historic post-Brexit trade accord</a></strong></p>.<p class="bodytext">If thus far politics appeared largely a charmed procession for a man with a flair for bombast and a colourful private life, he has been personally tested like never before by the Covid-19 crisis this year.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson, 56, was riding high after winning a thumping election victory in December, and his initial response to the outbreak sent his popularity ratings soaring.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But he was diagnosed in March with Covid-19 and ended up in intensive care, crediting two immigrant nurses with helping to pull him through.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The pandemic has claimed the lives of nearly 70,000 other Britons, however, and Johnson stands accused of lax leadership after a series of policy U-turns and, in the early days, inadequate preparation and testing.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson was born in New York in 1964 into a high-achieving family, and his sister said as a child he wanted to be "world king".</p>.<p class="bodytext">After his early years in Brussels, he attended the elite Eton school in England before studying Classics at Oxford University.</p>.<p class="bodytext">In his biography "Boris Johnson: The Gambler", released in October, journalist Tom Bower recounts the serial womanising that put paid to Johnson's two marriages and his casual relationship with the truth.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson is believed to have at least six children, including a seven-month-old baby with his fiancee Carrie Symonds, 32.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But Stanley Johnson emerges most unsympathetically from the biography, with Bower relating how the young Boris witnessed domestic violence and suffered from emotional neglect as a child.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The future prime minister first worked as a journalist for The Times, where he was sacked for making up a quote, and moved on to become Brussels correspondent for the right-wing Daily Telegraph newspaper.</p>.<p class="bodytext">There he made his name by writing "Euro-myths" -- exaggerated claims about the EU such as purported plans to standardise the sizes of condoms and bananas.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Interviewed later by the BBC, Boris Johnson likened his reporting to "chucking these rocks over the garden wall" into Britain and observing its "amazing explosive effect on the Tory party".</p>.<p class="bodytext">The experience gave him a "rather weird sense of power", he said.</p>.<p class="bodytext"><strong>Also Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/international/world-news-politics/brexit-trade-deal-sparks-relief-but-uk-market-will-bear-scars-931210.html">Brexit trade deal sparks relief but UK market will bear scars</a></strong></p>.<p class="bodytext">But his first few years in politics did not go smoothly -- in 2004, he was sacked from the Conservatives' shadow cabinet for lying about an extra-marital affair.</p>.<p class="bodytext">He rallied to become mayor of Labour-voting London in 2008, an achievement commentators put down to his brazen refusal to respect convention.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Even for an unpredictable politician like Johnson, his choice to support Brexit in Britain's fractious 2016 referendum was a huge gamble -- and it took a while to pay off.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When his side won, he was viewed as an obvious candidate to take over as prime minister, but pulled out of the race after a key supporter betrayed him.</p>.<p class="bodytext">He was named foreign secretary under new premier Theresa May, but quit two years later over her Brexit plan.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When she resigned after failing three times to get her EU divorce deal through parliament, Johnson took over.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Within six months he had renegotiated the deal, won an election and taken Britain out of the EU.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Those who did not take him seriously were wrong," French President Emmanuel Macron said at the time.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But after promising to "get Brexit done" with an "oven-ready deal", Johnson has found the process of extricating Britain fully out of the EU's embrace during an 11-month transition period this year no easy sell.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The trade deal is finally done, and Britain will now learn whether Johnson's huge wager that it will "prosper mightily" outside the EU will pay off.</p>
<p class="bodytext">Boris Johnson is intimately familiar with Brussels. Now he is leading Britain definitively out of the European project, armed with a trade deal four-and-a-half years after launching the biggest gamble of his career.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The Conservative prime minister spent part of his childhood in the EU capital, where his father Stanley worked for the European Commission, and lived there again as a journalist in the 1990s when he was given to tall tales about bureaucratic skullduggery.</p>.<p class="bodytext">It was perhaps understandable if he felt torn about which way to leap in Britain's 2016 Brexit referendum, famously drawing up a list of pros and cons for EU membership before throwing his considerable political charisma behind the "leave" campaign.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson's sway, and propensity for exaggeration, helped swing the bitterly divisive campaign and he intervened last year to end the subsequent political paralysis by seizing control of the Conservative party.</p>.<p class="bodytext"><strong>Also Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/international/world-news-politics/uk-eu-finalise-historic-post-brexit-trade-accord-931134.html">UK, EU finalise historic post-Brexit trade accord</a></strong></p>.<p class="bodytext">If thus far politics appeared largely a charmed procession for a man with a flair for bombast and a colourful private life, he has been personally tested like never before by the Covid-19 crisis this year.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson, 56, was riding high after winning a thumping election victory in December, and his initial response to the outbreak sent his popularity ratings soaring.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But he was diagnosed in March with Covid-19 and ended up in intensive care, crediting two immigrant nurses with helping to pull him through.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The pandemic has claimed the lives of nearly 70,000 other Britons, however, and Johnson stands accused of lax leadership after a series of policy U-turns and, in the early days, inadequate preparation and testing.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson was born in New York in 1964 into a high-achieving family, and his sister said as a child he wanted to be "world king".</p>.<p class="bodytext">After his early years in Brussels, he attended the elite Eton school in England before studying Classics at Oxford University.</p>.<p class="bodytext">In his biography "Boris Johnson: The Gambler", released in October, journalist Tom Bower recounts the serial womanising that put paid to Johnson's two marriages and his casual relationship with the truth.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Johnson is believed to have at least six children, including a seven-month-old baby with his fiancee Carrie Symonds, 32.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But Stanley Johnson emerges most unsympathetically from the biography, with Bower relating how the young Boris witnessed domestic violence and suffered from emotional neglect as a child.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The future prime minister first worked as a journalist for The Times, where he was sacked for making up a quote, and moved on to become Brussels correspondent for the right-wing Daily Telegraph newspaper.</p>.<p class="bodytext">There he made his name by writing "Euro-myths" -- exaggerated claims about the EU such as purported plans to standardise the sizes of condoms and bananas.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Interviewed later by the BBC, Boris Johnson likened his reporting to "chucking these rocks over the garden wall" into Britain and observing its "amazing explosive effect on the Tory party".</p>.<p class="bodytext">The experience gave him a "rather weird sense of power", he said.</p>.<p class="bodytext"><strong>Also Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/international/world-news-politics/brexit-trade-deal-sparks-relief-but-uk-market-will-bear-scars-931210.html">Brexit trade deal sparks relief but UK market will bear scars</a></strong></p>.<p class="bodytext">But his first few years in politics did not go smoothly -- in 2004, he was sacked from the Conservatives' shadow cabinet for lying about an extra-marital affair.</p>.<p class="bodytext">He rallied to become mayor of Labour-voting London in 2008, an achievement commentators put down to his brazen refusal to respect convention.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Even for an unpredictable politician like Johnson, his choice to support Brexit in Britain's fractious 2016 referendum was a huge gamble -- and it took a while to pay off.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When his side won, he was viewed as an obvious candidate to take over as prime minister, but pulled out of the race after a key supporter betrayed him.</p>.<p class="bodytext">He was named foreign secretary under new premier Theresa May, but quit two years later over her Brexit plan.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When she resigned after failing three times to get her EU divorce deal through parliament, Johnson took over.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Within six months he had renegotiated the deal, won an election and taken Britain out of the EU.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Those who did not take him seriously were wrong," French President Emmanuel Macron said at the time.</p>.<p class="bodytext">But after promising to "get Brexit done" with an "oven-ready deal", Johnson has found the process of extricating Britain fully out of the EU's embrace during an 11-month transition period this year no easy sell.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The trade deal is finally done, and Britain will now learn whether Johnson's huge wager that it will "prosper mightily" outside the EU will pay off.</p>