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Nigel Farage deletes tweet attacking Labour MP over 'links' to advocacy group Cage

Ukip leader back-tracked as a 'courtesy' to Sadiq Khan

Matt Dathan
Thursday 12 March 2015 17:46 GMT
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The 26-year-old is believed to have left Britain in 2012-13
The 26-year-old is believed to have left Britain in 2012-13 (AP)

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Nigel Farage was prolific on Twitter today as he sought to defend his call to scrap race discrimination laws in the UK, or at least his spin doctors were.

But one tweet that Mr Farage's team clearly regretted posting was one attacking Sadiq Khan, Labour’s shadow justice secretary, for speaking at an event hosted by Cage, the pressure group that defended the Isis murderer Mohammed Emwazi, known as Jihadi John.

The group caused uproar for describing the Isis terrorist as a "a beautiful and gentle" man.

The reports over the weekend of Mr Khan attending a Cage event were false however, as the group were not hosting the event but simply attending it alongside the Labour frontbencher.

A number of other MPs from across the political spectrum also spoke at the event, including Tory MP Zach Goldsmith, Green MP Caroline Lucas and Lib Dem MP according to Mr Khan’s office.

Determined to hit back at Mr Khan’s strongly-worded attack this morning, when he described Mr Farage’s comments on race relations “breathtakingly ignorant,” the Ukip leader tweeted:

“I hear Labour's Sadiq Khan is upset too. Well I'm pretty concerned that he spoke at a CAGE event. Will he answer to that?”

Campaign group Cage defended Mohammed Emwazi, better known as Jihadi John
Campaign group Cage defended Mohammed Emwazi, better known as Jihadi John (AP)

The tweet has since disappeared from his feed and one of his senior advisers admitted they decided to delete it as a “courtesy” to Mr Khan "because we try and take a decent and fair approach to our politics and communications".

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