BROADCASTING bosses were slammed today for instructing journalists not to say Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro had been “kidnapped.”

The BBC news memo was leaked to former Guardian journalist Owen Jones, who published it on his website.

The management memo refers to a discussion at a news meeting and said: “To ensure clarity and consistency in our reporting, please follow these guidelines when describing the recent events in Venezuela.”

BBC bosses said “captured” should be used when describing the US operation, and “seized” was “acceptable for use in our own reporting where appropriate.”

The memo also said that journalists should avoid using the term “kidnapped.”

A spokeswoman for Stop the War said: “Given that Trump himself has said kidnapping isn’t a bad term for the US’s capture of Maduro and his wife, it would seem BBC management has itself been kidnapped, or hijacked, by its own terror of further offending a war criminal.”

BBC bosses have been back-pedalling since apologising to President Trump for a Panorama broadcast last year about his speech before the Capitol riots, where different segments were spliced together to create a false impression.

The litigious US president has threatened to sue the BBC for libel, claiming he would seek billions in compensation, despite few people in the US seeing the broadcast.

BBC bosses have been on the back foot since the fallout from the Panorama episode, with director-general Tim Davies and news head Deborah Turness resigning last November.

The BBC did not respond when asked to confirm the leaked memo and comment on it.