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Boris Johnson ’s bid to boost Anglo-Spanish relations backfired spectacularly when he launched into a bizarre defence of bullfighting.

The blundering Foreign Secretary told a dinner to celebrate ties between the nations that trying to ban the ­cruel sport was ­“political ­correctness gone mad”.

MPs said the comments infuriated the Spanish at the event, many of whom are opposed to barbaric bullfighting .

(Image: Getty Images Europe)

One guest said Johnson “lectured” the Spanish and told them to keep supporting the “sport”.

The insider added: “He antagonised every Spaniard there. They fumed for the rest of the dinner. Bullfighting is the subject of lively debate. Some parts of Spain have banned it.

“The Spanish don’t like people painting a ­caricature of their country as ­bullfighting, flamenco and paella.” One Spanish guest told a British MP: “He’s a clown. He’s not fit to represent your country.”

And an industrialist at the dinner said Mr Johnson “was making fun of the barbaric”.

The Foreign ­Secretary’s latest gaffe came to light shortly after the Mirror told how both Tory and Labour MPs urged Theresa May to sack him over comments he made that could double the jail term of British mum Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe in Iran.

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(Image: Getty Images Europe)

Mr Johnson had claimed she was in the country training journalists – a ­statement Teheran insisted was “proof” she was there as a spy not a tourist.

According to his ­biographer Sonia Purnell, Mr Johnson and sister Rachel reported on animal welfare in Spain and Portugal in 1985. Her book said they took pictures of ­bullfights.

League Against Cruel Sports director of campaigns Chris Luffingham said: “If it’s true Boris Johnson has defended bullfighting, then it’s not ­political correctness that’s gone mad.

“If Boris has attended a bullfight, he would have seen a bull trapped in a small arena and attacked relentlessly with lances and barbed harpoons. The bull is weakened, confused and tortured before it is killed with a sword.

(Image: Getty)

“If Boris has seen this and still thinks ­bullfighting is defendable, then we’d be concerned about his judgment.”

Bullfighting was banned in Catalonia in 2010 and its popularity in other parts of Spain is in decline.

Mr Johnson made his comments at a dinner in Bath on Saturday ­organised to discuss Brexit and the Catalan crisis.

The Foreign Office said: “The Foreign Secretary was expressing a personal view that he respects this Spanish ­tradition. However, he does not ­personally support bullfighting and he is proud the UK upholds the highest in animal welfare standards, including the ban on bullfighting in the UK.”