A LABOUR council has been accused of cancelling one of Britain’s greatest explorers to “appease the woke minority”.

       A shopping centre named after Captain James Cook is facing a rebrand, while a museum dedicated to him is under threat of closure.

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       Middlesbrough council has been accused of cancelling local icon Captain James Cook Credit: Getty - Contributor 2

       The Labour-run council wants to remove Cook from street names and dissolve his museum Credit: Alamy

       It comes after statues of Cook, who discovered eastern Australia in 1770, were targeted during Black Lives Matters protests because he “symbolises racial oppression and violence”.

       The latest moves in Middlesbrough, Cook’s home town, have been criticised here and Down Under.

       Former town mayor Andy Preston said: “Is Middlesbrough’s Labour council whitewashing history to appease the woke minority?

       “In a baffling move, they’re spending money they don’t have to rename Captain Cook Square. Local boy Cook, the world’s greatest navigator, was the first European to encounter and chart Australia.”

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       Tees Valley’s Tory mayor Ben Houchen added: “Labour-run Middlesbrough council on the brink of bankruptcy… so obviously their priority is to cancel our most famous citizen, Captain James Cook, from the town by renaming areas of the town and removing him entirely and close down the Captain Cook Birthplace museum.”

       Australia’s former foreign minister Alexander Downer called it “another example of the mad ideology which has poisoned the modern political Left”.

       Cook was born in Middlesbrough in 1728 and is famous for his voyages in HMS Endeavour to Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii where he died in 1779 aged 50.

       Middlesbrough Council said the rebrand was down to the shopping centre but locals are now being consulted.

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       It said the future of the Captain Cook Birthplace Museum is being considered to save cash.