MP Tobias Ellwood met with an adviser to Donald Trump who was later arrested over statements to FBI agents about contact he had with the Russian government.

George Papadopoulos was on Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

Last month he pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI over US–Russia relations. An investigation by the Observer at the weekend said Papadopoulos had links to the British government including three ministers. It says the Foreign Office had confirmed Mr Ellwood met Papadopoulos at the UN general assembly in September last year, two months before Trump won the election.

Mr Ellwood was a minister in the Foreign Office at the time and is now at the Ministry of Defence. The newspaper says Mr Ellwood “has refused to comment on how contact was made or what was discussed.”