0 a word or sign with a special meaning, or a word used to keep something secret: --
"Long" and "frank" are all diplomatic code words for continuing disagreement.
1 a word or sign with a special meaning, or a word used to keep something secret: --
“Long,” “very thorough,” and “frank” are all diplomatic code words for continuing disagreement.
It would be absurd to suppose that a pilot in such circumstances would be able to "fish out" a code to learn what the code word meant.
This acted as a code word for the product thus avoiding embarrassment to the customer during the post-war years.
We know that "diversity" is a code word for selection and a return to the 11-plus—the examination that dares not speak its name.
It is a code word of which one does not understand the exact meaning.
We certainly think that that is a code word for selection.
Behind each code word in the negotiating process looms an existential danger to a small beleaguered country.
But he gave a clue which was to become the code word in his final telegram to the family.
It is a code word for something else.
