Corbyn slams claims about Czech spy as ‘ridiculous’

‘Smear’: Jeremy Corbyn JEREMY Corbyn has dismissed claims that he met and briefed a Czech spy during the Cold War years as a “ridiculous smear”.

According to a report, the Labour leader held three meetings with a “communist spy” some 32 years ago and allegedly warned about a clampdown by British intelligence on European spies in the UK.

It was claimed that in 1986 he met with the Soviet-backed agent Lieutenant Jan Dymic in the House of Commons on two separate occasions.

But a spokesman for the Labour leader said the claim that Mr Corbyn was an “agent, asset or informer” for any intelligence agency “is entirely false and a ridiculous smear”.

They added: “Like other MPs, Jeremy has met diplomats from many countries.

“In the 1980s he met a Czech diplomat, who did not go by the name of Jan Dymic, for a cup of tea in the House of Commons.

“Jeremy neither had nor offered any privileged information to this or any other diplomat.

“During the Cold War, intelligence officers notoriously claimed to superiors to have recruited people they had merely met.

“The existence of these bogus claims does not make them in any way true.”

The story in The Sun newspaper, which ran under the headline ‘Corbyn and the Commie spy’, alleged that Soviet-backed intelligence officers placed Mr Corbyn — then a backbench MP for just three years — on a “list of the Czechoslovakian state security team’s agents and sources”.

The claims are based on documentation released in Prague relating to the former police state and in an unsurprising note, officials said Mr Corbyn was “negative towards USA, as well as the current politics of the Conservative government”.

After allegedly meeting with the MP for Islington North, a note added: “Behaviour is reserved and courteous, however, occasionally explosive (when speaking about human rights), though the performance is calm and collected.”