From her unique perspective as former French ambassador to the UK, Sylvie Bermann examines the mistruths told by politicians surrounding the fateful 2016 Brexit referendum.

Sylvie Bermann is a career diplomat and was the French ambassador to the United Kingdom between 2014 and 2017. She grew up in Lyon, and studied history at Paris-Sorbonne and then specialised in oriental languages. Later she studied at the Beijing Language and Culture University, where she had her first taste of diplomacy as a closely monitored exchange student after the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976. She became the first female French ambassador to China in 2011. She was Director for the United Nations, International Organisations, Human Rights and Francophonie from 2005 to 2011. She also became the ambassador for France in Russia in 2017, before she retired from the French foreign ministry in 2020. In July 2021 she was appointed by OSCE as a mediator and coordinator of the political branch of the trilateral contact group in charge of the implementation of the Minsk agreement on Donbas.