LONDON: Britain’s opposition Labour Party suspended former London mayor Ken Livingstone on Thursday in a row over anti-Semitism, as the party struggles with deep divisions since electing a hard-left leader last summer.
Dozens of Labour lawmakers had demanded that leader Jeremy Corbyn suspend Livingstone - his ally and a party veteran - over remarks he made about Hitler being a Zionist in defence of a colleague the party suspended a day earlier over anti-Semitic remarks.
The Labour party has been struggling to pull together after Corbyn swept into the leadership in September on a wave of enthusiasm, particularly among younger members, for change and an end to ‘establishment politics’.
Corbyn’s views have often jarred with many Labour lawmakers in parliament, however, dividing the party at a time when it is trying to hold the government, which is also deeply split over Britain’s membership of the European Union, to account.
“Ken Livingstone has been suspended by the Labour Party, pending an investigation, for bringing the Party into disrepute,” the Labour Party said in a statement.
It said another lawmaker, John Mann, had been summoned over his behaviour after he was filmed shouting “You’ve lost it” at Livingstone and accusing him of being a “Nazi apologist” over the former mayor’s comments that Hitler had supported Zionism “before he went mad and ended up killing 6 million Jews”.