Jeremy Corbyn’s anti-apartheid efforts were snubbed by Nelson Mandela for “hindering” the campaign against racial segregation inSouth Africa, it has emerged.

The Labour MP was famously arrested for his participation in a picket outside the South African embassy which demanded Mr Mandela's release from prison during the 1980s.

But efforts to arrange a meeting between Mr Mandela and the ultra-left splinter group which planned the four-year long protest outside the South African embassy repeatedly failed.

A new book reveals that City of London Anti-Apartheid Group (CLAAG), of which Mr Corbyn was an active member, asked for a meeting when Mr Mandela visited Britain following his release from prison in 1990.

But despite staging a 1,408 day picket to campaign for his release, Mr Mandela’s African National Congress (ANC) party advised him against meeting Mr Corbyn’s cohort, because they weren’t part of the mainstream Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM).

“Youth Activism and Solidarity: The Non-Stop Picket Against Apartheid”, written by academics Gavin Brown and Helen Yaffe and published in February, describes Mr Corbyn as a “sponsor” of the CLAAG’s “Non-Stop Picket”.