Corbyn apologizes to Labour supporters for election debacle

Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, has apologized for his party's disastrous results in Thursday's snap general election that saw Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservatives win a huge majority in parliament.

Labour lost 59 seats as the Conservative Party won a majority of 365 in the 650-member parliament with 43.6 per cent of votes under Britain's constituency based, winner-takes-all electoral system.

"I wanted to unite the country that I love but I'm sorry that we came up short and I take my responsibility for it," Corbyn, who has agreed to step down early next year, wrote in the Labour-supporting Sunday Mirror.

"The polarization in the country over Brexit made it more difficult for a party with strong electoral support on both sides," he wrote in The Observer, The Guardian's Sunday newspaper.

Johnson campaigned to "get Brexit done" while Corbyn offered voters a second referendum on Brexit but said Labour would remain neutral on the outcome.

"I believe we paid a price for being seen by some as trying to straddle that divide or re-run the referendum," Corbyn wrote.

Many politicians and media commentators, including some Labour lawmakers, questioned Corbyn's leadership over Brexit.

They also accused the veteran anti-racism campaigner of failing to tackle anti-Semitism in Labour linked to fervent support for Palestinian causes by many party members.

There was "a ferocious smear and fear campaign against us," Corbyn, 70, wrote in the Mirror.

"We've never known a politician to be vilified and smeared so much," his three adult sons wrote in an online statement on Saturday.