• The woman Boris Johnson is accused of giving favours to while Mayor of London speaks out in her first broadcast interview.
  • Jennifer Arcuri refused to confirm or deny to ITV’s Good Morning Britain whether she had a sexual relationship with the prime minister.
  • She described Johnson as a “very close friend” who visited her London flat around 10 times.
  • “It’s no one’s business what private life we had, or didn’t have,” she said.
  • Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

The woman at the cente of a sex scandal which threatens to drag Boris Johnson into a criminal inquiry, has refused to confirm or deny having a sexual relationship with the prime minister, as it would be “weaponised” against him.

The tech entrepeneur and former model Jennifer Arcuri, who has reportedly told friends she was in a sexual relationship with Johnson, told ITV on Monday it was “no-one’s business” whether they had an affair while he was Mayor of London.

She admitted that Johnson, who she described as “a very close friend” who she “cares about deeply,” visited her east London flat around 10 times, but denied that their close relationship was the reason why Johnson had granted her thousands of pounds of public money as well as access to foreign trade missions.

Asked repeatedly whether she had engaged in a sexual relationship with the prime minister, Arcuri relied that “it’s no one’s business what private life we had, or didn’t have.”

She added: "Because the press have made me this objectified, ex-model pole dancer, I really am not going to answer that question."

"It's no one's business what private life we had, or didn't have," she said.

"Because the press have made me this objectified, ex-model pole dancer, I really am not going to answer that question...

"I'm not going to let you put me in a position where you weaponise my answer."

Johnson is under a number of investigations

The prime minister's relationship with Arcuri is now the subject of multiple investigations.

Read more: Boris Johnson plans to use the Queen to deliver an election broadcast for the Conservative Party

An internal investigation by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport into a grant of £100,000 to Arcuri's "Hacker House" company is underway, as are separate investigations by the London Assembly and the Greater London Authority (GLA.)

At the centre of the investigation is the allegation that Johnson failed to declare his relationship with Arcuri before overruling officials in order to grant heraccess to foreign trade missions. Correspondence seen by Business Insider confirms that officials working for Johnson intervened to ensure her attendance on the trips.

Last month the GLA's monitoring officer referred the matter to the independent police complaints watchdog to judge whether it warranted a full criminal investigation into a potential misconduct in office offence.

Arcuri denied a report in last week's Sunday Times that Johnson had recommended her for a senior tech job as fake news, adding: "Boris never wrote me a letter. Never."

In a bizarre moment when asked by host Piers Morgan whether Johnson had ever used the pole-dancing pole in her flat, she replied "I'm never going to tell you that."

Pressed again about her relationship with Johnson, she asked Morgan: "has it been ten minutes yet. Are you falling in love with me?"