Tory MP charged by police in new headache for Rishi Sunak
Colonel Bob Stewart MP speaking in the Palace of Westminster in London
PA
A senior Conservative MP has been charged with two public order offences, the Metropolitan Police has confirmed.
Bob Stewart, 73, a former Colonel in the British Army, is due to appear in Westminster Magistrates' Court on July 5.
The Beckenham MP, who first entered the House of Commons in 2010, was charged by postal requisition in connection with an incident in Belgravia last December.
He is facing charges of using threatening or abusive words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour.
Colonel Bob Stewart MP speaking in the Palace of Westminster in LondonPAThe first charge relates to threatening or abusive words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour when the alleged offence was racially aggravated.
The second involves threatening or abusive words or behaviour likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress.
Scotland Yard said in December it would investigate the incident after Stewart was embroiled in a spat with a protester outside the Bahraini embassy.
In footage which circulated on social media, the Beckenham MP told an activist: "Go away, I hate you.
Bob Stewart during an appearance with Nigel Farage on GB News
GB News
"You make a lot of fuss. Go back to Bahrain."
Stewart later said: “I apologise if anybody thinks I was being racist – I was not.
“I meant go back to Bahrain, which is a perfectly safe place, and protest there.
"If anyone thinks I've been racist I honestly didn't mean to be, and I apologise if they think that, and I wasn't."
Bob Stewart during a previous appearance on GB News
GB News
During the confrontation, an activist from the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy asked the veteran Conservative MP: "How much did you sell yourself to the Bahraini regime?"
The activist, later named as Sayed Alwadaei, was referring to a trip paid for by the Bahraini government ahead of its elections.
Alwadaei is living in exile after being tortured in the Gulf state over his involvement in anti-government protests in 2011.
Stewart previously claimed he was "goaded into a response" and labelled the exchange a "mistake on my part".
Bob Stewart claimed he was "goaded" into a confrontation near Bahrain's embassy
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The Beckenham MP, who was stationed in Bahrain in 1969, registered flights, accommodation and meals worth £5,349 during a four-day trip to Bahrain in November last year.
A separate entry revealed Manama covered another trip to an air show to meet Bahrain's foreign minister worth £1,245.56.
Following the incident, Stewart stressed he had "never taken a personal penny" from the authorities in Bahrain for his role as chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group.