'SAS: Who Dares Wins' Ant Middleton apologises for Black Lives Matter tweet

SAS: Who Dares Wins star Ant Middleton has apologised for any offence caused by his use of the word “scum” in a now-deleted tweet about the Black Lives Matter protests.

The former royal marine – known for putting celebrities through their paces on the Channel 4 show – originally posted a comment about the violence taking place on the streets of London over the weekend when far-right demonstrators launched a counter-protest against the Black Lives Matter movement.

The deleted tweet read: "The extreme left against the extreme right. When did two wrongs make a right. It was only a matter of time. BLM and EDL are not welcome on our streets, absolute scum. What a great example you are to your future generation. Bravo."

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Middleton, 39, has now posted a video saying sorry, captioned: "Posting a message in relation to a tweet I took down over the weekend. I took it down immediately but I wanted to make sure I've been clear and upfront about why I took it down...”

In the video, he said: "I'd just like to clarify a tweet I put out this weekend and deleted straight away, once I re-read and realised it could cause offence.

"I put out a tweet, retweeted a video of the violence, the terror, the chaos that was happening on the streets of London and within that tweet I mentioned the BLM and the EDL and the word 'scum'."

"At no point was I calling the BLM scum and comparing the two organisations. I want to make that really clear.

"The word ‘scum’ was used to describe the people in video that were violent, that were causing terror on the streets of London, and setting a bad example for our future generation."

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He went on: "For those of you who know me, I'm a people's person, I love people, I'm anti-racist and I'm anti-violence, having lived and seen what violence does to people and cities and countries.

"So I apologise if my tweet came across as offensive. I never meant for that. I'm here to push for positive change."

Former British army soldier Middleton is the chief instructor on the Channel 4 show which sees contestants endure a rigorous training programme testing the mental and physical strength.

The most recent Celebrity SAS series featured model Katie Price, reality star Joey Essex and footballer John Fashanu and was won by Rudimental DJ Locksmith and Paralympian Lauren Steadman.