A British Foreign Office minister has denied the claim that Prime Minister Boris Johnson played a role in the airlift of 163 cats and dogs out of Afghanistan, calling the allegation “absurd.” Zac Goldsmith, Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park, told the House of Lords on Wednesday that Johnson “had zero role in authorising individual evacuations from Afghanistan during Operation Pitting”—a two-week Royal Air Force Operation to evacuate British nationals and the UK’s Afghan allies out of Kabul after the Afghan capital fell under Taliban control. It comes a week after Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee published leaked emails, including one from an official in Goldsmith’s private office, saying “the PM has just authorised” the rescue of animals and shelter staff to be evacuated on Aug. 25. Johnson has dismissed the accusation from opposition parties that he lied about his alleged intervention, calling it “total rhubarb”—British slang for complete nonsense. Paul Farthing, an …