Former PM Boris Johnson is made a Kyivan by ex-boxer brothers Vitali (left), the city’s mayor, and Wladimir Klitschko (Picture: Reuters)

Vladimir Putin will not use nuclear weapons, Boris Johnson has insisted – while aiming an ice hockey-themed warning at the Russian leader.

Canada’s deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland called for more support for Ukraine with a sporting analogy at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

‘I don’t skate to where the puck is – I skate to where the puck is going,’ she said.

‘This puck is going to Ukrainian victory, so let’s skate there.’

Mr Johnson quipped: ‘Tell Putin to get the puck out of Ukraine’ to laughter from the audience.

The ex-PM – made an honorary citizen of Kyiv at the event – was introduced as ‘a legendary figure’ in the country Russia invaded 11 months ago.

Johnson made his audience laugh by telling Vladimir Putin to get the ‘puck out of Ukraine’ (Picture: PA)

He said deploying nuclear weapons would make Mr Putin’s country ‘a complete economic cryogenic paralysis’, turn states such as China and India against him, and terrify Russians.

‘He’s not going to do it. Don’t go down that rabbit hole, stop it,’ Mr Johnson said.

‘Putin wants to present it as a nuclear stand-off between Nato and Russia,’ he added. ‘Nonsense. He’s not going to use nuclear weapons, OK?’

Russian president Vladimir Putin was also likened to ‘the fat boy in Dickens’ (Picture: Shutterstock)

Mr Johnson – famed for his literary references – said of Mr Putin: ‘He’s like the fat boy in Dickens. He wants to make our flesh creep. He wants us to think about it. He’s never going to do it.’

In Charles Dickens’s first novel The Pickwick Papers, a servant known as Joe the fat boy tells an elderly lady, ‘I wants to make your flesh creep’, with a shocking revelation about her daughter.

Mr Johnson – booted out by his party in September amid uproar over lockdown-breaking parties in No.10 – also urged the audience to ‘stop worrying about Kremlinology’.

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He joked: ‘It’s difficult to work out what’s gonna happen in UK politics, let alone in the Kremlin. What we’ve got to focus on is supporting Ukraine and giving Volodymyr Zelensky the tools he needs to finish the job. They can win and they will win. Give them the tanks.’

Britain is to supply Ukraine with Challenger 2 battle tanks.

Mr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, addressed the event at the Swiss ski resort by video link and asked countries to move faster in supplying weapons.

‘The vaccine against Russian tyranny is available,’ he said.

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‘Tell Putin to get the puck out of Ukraine.’