Boris Johnson keeps getting openly mocked by European diplomats

The German and French foreign ministers have criticised Boris Johnson’s suggestion that it was “complete baloney” that access to the single market should require maintaining freedom of movement.

The comments came during the British foreign secretary’s interview with Sky News in New York earlier this week.

Speaking at a joint news conference with French foreign minister Michel Sapin, German's Wolfgang Schaeuble responded to Mr Johnson’s comments by saying:

If we need to do more, we will gladly send her majesty's foreign minister a copy of the Lisbon Treaty. Then he can read that there is a certain link between the single market and the four core principles in Europe. I can also say it in English. So if clarification is necessary we can pay a visit and explain this to him in good English.

Sapin, in a clear mock of Johnson’s “baloney” jibe, quipped:

There are four freedoms and they cannot be separated. So if we want to make good European paté then there are four freedoms that together make up the paté in question.

This is not the first time that Johnson has caused a stir among diplomats.

Speaking before his appointment, Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim said the former London mayor had made an "unfortunate statement" when he used Turkey's accession to the EU negatively in the referendum even suggesting that “May God help him and reform him”.

Back in July, some of his European colleagues were less than complimentary about their new counterpart:

And an unnamed diplomat told the Financial Times that the bloc's officials generally think there are six Boris Johnsons: