Murdoch tabloid private eye to reveal hacking orders (Reuters)

LONDON (Reuters) – A private detective jailed for illegally intercepting voicemail messages on behalf of a journalist at one of Rupert Murdoch's British newspapers has been ordered to reveal who asked him to carry out the phone-hacking.

The demand by London's High Court will shed further light on how widespread the hacking practice was at the News of the World tabloid and add to the pressure on News International, the British newspaper arm of Murdoch's News Corp.

Glenn Mulcaire was jailed in 2007 along with the paper's ex-royal correspondent Clive Goodman for illegally accessing the voicemails of royal aides and five other figures including the model Elle Macpherson.

Lawyers for actor Steve Coogan, who believes he is a victim of phone-hacking and is suing News International, said on Friday the court had refused Mulcaire leave to appeal against a decision ordering him to reveal who instructed him to hack the phones.

John Kelly of law firm Schillings told Reuters that Mulcaire, who is suing News International himself after they stopped paying his legal fees, would have to answer their questions in a formal document to be filed at the court before September. This should be available for the public to see.

"He will now have to identify exactly who at the News of the World asked him to access the mobile phones of the named individuals and who he provided the information to at the News of the World," Kelly said.

"Mr Mulcaire is due to provide these answers by the end of the month and we await his answers with interest."

After Mulcaire and Goodman's conviction in 2007, News International repeatedly insisted that phone-hacking was limited to a single rogue reporter.

But in the face of civil action from Coogan and other figures, the company admitted earlier this year it had evidence that the practice was more widespread, prompting a new police inquiry.

Some executives, including Murdoch's son James, chairman of News International, are facing accusations that they knew about the illegal activities at a far earlier date than they had previously admitted.

Other senior figures, including former editorial staff on the now defunct paper, have been arrested by police probing allegations journalists on the News of the World illegally intercepted the voicemails of mobile phones of celebrities, politicians, as well as victims of crime and their families.

It has also caused embarrassment for Prime Minister David Cameron whose former media chief -- previously a News of the World editor -- is one of those to have been arrested as part of the probe.

PHONE-HACKING DETECTIVE ARRESTED

In a twist on Friday, London police said one of the detectives involved in the inquiry, named Operation Weeting, had been arrested on suspicion of leaking details about the case.

The Metropolitan Police's anti-corruption unit detained the 51-year-old detective constable at work on Thursday. He is accused of misconduct in a public office and has been released on police bail and suspended from duty.

"I made it very clear when I took on this investigation the need for operational and information security," said Deputy Assistant Commissioner Sue Akers who is leading the inquiry.

"It is hugely disappointing that this may not have been adhered to."

On Thursday, detectives arrested a senior Hollywood reporter from the News of the World, an arrest which was reported in detail by Britain's Guardian newspaper before any official announcement from the police.

Meanwhile, detectives from the Weeting team made their 14th arrest on Friday, a 35-year-old man who was held on suspicion of conspiring to unlawfully intercept voicemails. A source with knowledge of the inquiry named him as Dan Evans, a former feature writer on the tabloid.

He was detained after arriving by appointment at a London police station and later released on police bail until October.

(Additional reporting by Georgina Prodhan, editing by Rosalind Russell)

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Cameron "regrets" hiring scandal-hit tabloid editor (Reuters)

LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister David Cameron, defending his integrity to parliament in emergency session on Wednesday, said he regretted hiring a journalist at the heart of a scandal that has rocked Britain's press, police and politics.

But in hours of stormy questioning he seemed to rally his Conservative party behind him and stopped short of bowing to demands that he apologize outright for what the Labour leader called a "catastrophic error of judgment" in appointing as his spokesman a former editor of Rupert Murdoch's News of the World.

Only if Andy Coulson, who has since resigned, should turn out to have lied about not knowing of illegal practices at his newspaper would the prime minister offer a "profound apology."

Analysts said Cameron emerged from the debate looking stronger than when he was forced to fly home early from Africa to face lawmakers who had delayed their summer recess by a day. But he left some lingering questions unanswered, notably about his role in Murdoch's takeover bid for TV network BSkyB.

After his toughest two weeks in office, the 44-year-old premier spoke with feeling of the Coulson saga: "You live and you learn -- and believe you me, I have learnt," he said.

"It was my decision ... Of course I regret and I am extremely sorry about the furor it has caused. With 20:20 hindsight ... I would not have offered him the job."

He said of Coulson, who is under suspicion of conspiring to intercept calls and bribe police: "I have an old-fashioned view about innocent until proven guilty. But if it turns out I have been lied to, that would be a moment for a profound apology.

"And, in that event, I can tell you I will not fall short."

Beleaguered but hardly under serious threat of being ousted by his party allies after less than 15 months in power, Cameron defended his actions and those of his staff in dealings with Murdoch's News Corp global media empire and with two senior police chiefs who resigned this week over the affair.

"He seems to have gained a bit of breathing space over the course of this debate," said Andrew Russell, senior politics lecturer at Manchester University. "He looked more self assured today than he has been for a little while."

Conservative member of parliament George Eustice spoke for a party relieved by the leader's performance: "Cameron did really well. He's got back on the front foot and taken the initiative."

He added: "The idea that his position as prime minister was in doubt was a complete nonsense."

LABOUR ATTACK

Labour's Ed Miliband, whose muted first year as opposition leader has been fired up by attacking Cameron on the scandal, has not gone so far as to demand Cameron's resignation.

But he asked during the debate: "Why doesn't he do more than give a half-apology and provide the full apology now for hiring Mr Coulson and bringing him into the heart of Downing Street?"

Opposition members of parliament questioned the credibility of Cameron's defense that Coulson had assured him when being hired in 2007 that, as editor of the News of the World, he knew nothing of the hacking of voicemails which led to the paper's royal correspondent and an investigator being jailed.

Coulson left Cameron's office in January just before police reopened an investigation in which Coulson and his predecessor as editor, Rebekah Brooks, have been arrested and bailed.

Labour lawmakers also questioned Cameron about contacts with Murdoch and his staff, including his friendship with Brooks, who resigned as head of British newspaper unit News International.

The prime minister repeatedly deflected questions on what he may have discussed with News Corp about its $12-billion bid to buy out other shareholders in BSkyB. He insisted he had "no inappropriate" conversations and played no role in a government decision to let the bid proceed in the face of protests it would give Murdoch too great a share of media ownership in Britain.

Last week, as scandal engulfed News International, Cameron joined Labour in calling for News Corp to drop it. It did.

While he has derided suggestions from some on the left that backing the BSkyB bid might have been a payback for Murdoch's papers switching from supporting Labour to promoting Cameron at the 2010 election, Cameron told parliament it may make sense to "further remove politicians" from decisions about media mergers.

Tim Bale, politics professor at Sussex University, said Cameron had sounded evasive on the subject and could face a drip-feed of criticism from the scandal for a long time: "There was a very strong sense of him searching for a form of words that would not get him into trouble. The Commons picked up on that and there will be more questions to answer in that regard."

Before the debate, a poll by Reuters/Ipsos MORI showed Britons' satisfaction with Cameron had fallen to its lowest level since he entered office in May last year. Only 38 percent were happy with the way he was doing his job.

But Helen Cleary of Ipsos MORI cautioned: "We know from other scandals that public opinion tends to bounce back."

And she added: "Even now, after Ed Miliband's boost from the scandal, Cameron is ahead ... on personal satisfaction ratings."

Cameron tried during the debate to move the political agenda away from the scandal, saying voters wanted him to concentrate on handling an economic crisis and other pressing matters.

Bale said: "It's going to be very difficult to draw a line under it permanently. But stressing the need to ... start talking about some of the very serious issues on the economy that are going on makes intuitive sense to a lot of people."

CAMERON ATTACKS

As the rowdy session in the House of Commons continued, he also landed blows of his own by pointing out the close relations Miliband's predecessors, Labour prime ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, had maintained with Murdoch, who has been courted and feared by British leaders for four decades.

Referring to Brooks's reported attendance at a gathering hosted by Brown's wife at the prime minister's official country residence in 2008, Cameron taunted the Labour benches: "I've never held a slumber party or seen her in her pajamas."

He referred repeatedly to controversial former journalists hired by Labour and to another former News International reporter, from the Times, who is now a senior aide to Miliband.

A day after Murdoch apologized to a parliamentary committee but denied personal responsibility for the affair, Cameron gave details of a judicial inquiry he has ordered into the scandal and wider issues it has raised over relationships among Britain's media, police and political establishment.

The smoldering scandal exploded in the public consciousness on July 4, when the family of a schoolgirl abducted and murdered in 2002 said police had told them they believed someone from the paper had hacked in to the teenager's voicemail, misleading detectives looking for her and giving her parents false hope.

Police say 60 officers are probing the hacking of messages of possibly 4,000 people, not just the rich, famous or powerful, but crime victims and families of soldiers killed in action.

Many of the leads come from the notes of Glenn Mulcaire, an investigator jailed with the News of the World reporter in 2007.

The 80-year-old Murdoch, who was attacked by a protester with a foam pie during Tuesday's committee hearing, sent a message to his staff that his company was taking steps to ensure that "serious problems never happen again." [ID:nL6E7IK092]

"Those who have betrayed our trust must be held accountable under the law," he said in an e-mail sent late on Tuesday.

An ethics board which Murdoch set up this week said it had now ended continuing payments for legal costs to Mulcaire -- payments questioned by the parliamentary committee on Tuesday.

Cameron's Media Minister Jeremy Hunt said News International still needed to explain how malpractice happened without Murdoch or his son James, now News International chairman, being told. They shut down the 168-year-old News of the World this month.

Shares in News Corp gained 0.7 percent in New York, adding to Tuesday's 5.5 percent rise. Some investors speculate the scandal may hasten a handover of power in the company from the Murdoch family in a way that may streamline global operations.

In Murdoch's native Australia, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the local arm of News Corp would face "hard questions" after the phone-hacking in Britain.

(Additional reporting by Tim Castle, Kate Holton, Mohammed Abbas, Paul Hoskins, Peter Griffiths, Olesya Dmitracova, Georgina Prodhan and Stephen Mangan; Writing by Alastair Macdonald)

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Murdoch swoops into UK with last tabloid in hands (AP)

LONDON – With the last edition of Britain's News of the World tabloid in hand, Rupert Murdoch swooped into the U.K. on Sunday to face the growing phone-hacking scandal that prompted the paper's closure and threatens to derail a $19 billion broadcasting deal.

Murdoch's first order of business upon arrival was to visit the east London offices of his U.K. newspaper division, News International. The 80-year-old Murdoch arrived in the front passenger seat of a red Range Rover with a copy of the last issue of the best-selling Sunday tabloid in his hands.

He left after about an hour and a half and returned to his London apartment, where he held a meeting with Rebekah Brooks, who is head of News Corp.'s U.K. newspaper operations.

It wasn't immediately clear what happened at both meetings. News International declined to comment on Murdoch's movements or plans while in the U.K.

Many journalists and media watchers have expressed astonishment that Brooks, who was previously editor of News of the World when some of the hacking allegedly occurred, was keeping her current job while the paper's employees were laid off.

Murdoch on Saturday told reporters in Sun Valley, Idaho, that Brooks had his "total" support.

Britons, meanwhile, were snapping up the last edition of the News of the World, after the 168-year-old muckraking paper was brought down in a phone-hacking scandal. Allegations the paper's journalists paid police for information and hacked into the voicemails of young murder victims and the grieving families of dead soldiers prompted Murdoch's News International to shut down the tabloid.

The 8,674th edition apologizes for letting the paper's readers down, but stops short of acknowledging recent allegations that its journalists paid police for information.

"We praised high standards, we demanded high standards but, as we are now only too painfully aware, for a period of a few years up to 2006 some who worked for us, or in our name, fell shamefully short of those standards," read a full-page editorial in the paper. "Quite simply, we lost our way. Phones were hacked, and for that this newspaper is truly sorry."

The developments have turned up the heat on Britain's media industry amid concerns a police investigation won't stop with the News of the World, and cast new scrutiny on the cozy relationship between British politicians and the tabloid press.

Murdoch, who has long been considered a kingmaker in the British media establishment, is facing a maelstrom of criticism and outrage not just over the new allegations of impropriety at his tabloid, but also the decision to shut the paper and put 200 journalists out of work.

Closing down the News of the World, which was launched Oct. 1, 1843, was seen by some as a desperate attempt by the media conglomerate to stem negative fallout and thus save its 12 billion-pound ($19 billion) deal to take over satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting.

The British government has signaled that deal will be delayed because of the crisis, and the scandal has continued to unfold at breakneck pace in the media, prompting broader questions about corruption at the newspaper and media regulation in the U.K.

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Cassandra Vinograd can be reached at http://twitter.com/CassVinograd

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UK tabloid writes own obit amid hacking scandal (AP)

LONDON – Writing the obituary for their own newspaper, News of the World's journalists prepared their final edition Saturday as Britain's media establishment reeled from the expanding phone-hacking scandal that brought down the muckraking tabloid after 168 years.

Small clues gave the tone of the London newsroom away — from a commemorative T-shirt bearing a "Goodbye, cruel News of the World, I'm leaving you today" worn by one staffer, to editors typing tributes to the tabloid's journalistic victories into newspaper text boxes.

Rupert Murdoch, whose media empire owns the paper, will arrive in London on Sunday on a scheduled visit, a person familiar with his itinerary told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

He is facing a maelstrom of criticism and outrage over the sequence of events set off by allegations the paper's journalists paid police for information and hacked into the voicemails of young murder victims and the grieving families of dead soldiers.

The recent revelations culminated in the decision to close the paper and put 200 journalists out of work.

The paper's editor, Colin Myler, offered words of encouragement and sympathy to his staff on a "very difficult day."

"It's not where we want to be and it's not where we deserve to be," he said in a memo to staff seen by Britain's Press Association. "But I know we will produce a paper to be proud of."

The contents of the front page were privy to "only a special few," according to Helen Moss, a news and features editor who offered refreshments to journalists camped outside the tabloid's headquarters in a bizarre death watch of sorts.

"I expect it'll be a massive tribute to 168 years of history ending today," she said, describing an "extremely emotional" newsroom.

Much of the emotion continued to focus on New International — a subsidiary of Murdoch's News Corp. — which took the decision to jettison the paper on Thursday after the new allegations sparked a fierce backlash and the flight of advertisers.

The scandal exploded this week after it was reported that the News of the World had hacked the mobile phone of 13-year-old murder victim Milly Dowler in 2002 while her family and police were desperately searching for her. News of the World operatives reportedly deleted some messages from the phone's voicemail, giving the girl's parents false hope that she was still alive.

That ignited public outrage far beyond any previous reaction to press intrusion into the lives of politicians and celebrities, which the paper has acknowledged and for which it has paid compensation to some prominent victims, including actress Sienna Miller.

Revelations that journalists paid police for information added fuel to the fire, prompting calls for a boycott and causing dozens of companies to pull their advertising from the paper amid fears they would be tainted by association.

James Murdoch — tipped by many as a likely successor to his father — then announced Thursday that this Sunday's edition of the tabloid would be its last and all revenue from it will go to "good causes."

The closure was seen by some as a desperate attempt by the media conglomerate to stem negative fallout and thus save its 12 billion-pound ($19 billion) deal to take over satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting.

But the British government has signaled that deal will be delayed because of the crisis and the scandal has continued to unfold with the announcement of three arrests linked to the matter on Friday.

Andy Coulson — a former News of the World editor and ex-communications chief to Prime Minister David Cameron — was arrested Friday, as was Clive Goodman, an ex-News of the World royal reporter, and an unidentified 63-year-old man. All three have since been released on bail.

The developments have turned up the heat on Britain's media industry amid concerns a police investigation won't stop with the News of the World.

It has also cast new scrutiny on the cozy relationship between British politicians and the powerful Murdoch empire, putting the media baron's company on the defensive.

Many journalists and media watchers have expressed astonishment that Rebekah Brooks, who was editor of News of the World when some of the hacking allegedly occurred, was keeping her job at head of News Corp.'s U.K. newspaper operations while the paper's 200 employees were laid off.

She told lawmakers she had "no knowledge whatsoever" of the Milly Dowler hacking or any other case while she was editor, according to a letter published by Britain's home affairs select committee on Saturday.

"I also want to reassure you that the practice of phone hacking is not continuing at the News of the World," she said in response to the committee's request for new evidence. "For the avoidance of doubt, I should add that we have no reason to believe that any phone hacking occurred at any other of our titles."

While she has been portrayed as a villain in the unfolding story, Brooks — with strong connections to British politics and decades of experience behind her — has insisted she is the right person to lead News International through the crisis.

Upping the ante, the Church of England threatened to pull nearly 4 million pounds of investments from News Corp. "if does not hold senior executives to account ... for the gross failures of management at the News of the World."

The church's ethical investment advisory group said Sunday it wrote to News Corp. saying closing News of the World was not a "sufficient response" to the "utterly reprehensible and unethical" practices uncovered at the tabloid.

Murdoch has opted to remain largely silent amid the fallout, issuing one official statement that made clear Brooks would remain at the helm.

He spoke briefly to reporters in Sun Valley, Idaho on Saturday, where he was attending a media conference. When asked whose decision it was to close the paper he said, "It was a collective decision."

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Julie Jacobson contributed to this report from Sun Valley, Idaho.

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Cassandra Vinograd can be reached at http://twitter.com/CassVinograd

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British PM's ex-aide arrested over tabloid scandal (AFP)

LONDON (AFP) – Police arrested David Cameron's ex-media chief and a former royal reporter over Britain's tabloid phone hacking row Friday as the prime minister promised urgent inquiries into the spiralling scandal.

Cameron looked rattled during the toughest press conference of his year in power, but he defended his decision to hire Andy Coulson, the former editor of Rupert Murdoch's News of the World tabloid, which is to shut this weekend.

He admitted the scandal went to the heart of the British establishment, saying: "The truth is, we have all been in this together -- the press, politicians and leaders of all parties, and yes, that includes me."

Cameron said he gave Coulson a "second chance" after he quit the News of the World in 2007 when two people were jailed over hacking. Coulson then resigned from Cameron's Downing Street office in January, citing pressure over the claims.

"The decision to hire him was mine and mine alone, and I take full responsibility for it," Cameron said, adding however that Coulson "became a friend and is a friend".

Murdoch caused astonishment on Thursday when he killed off the 168-year-old News of the World, Britain's biggest selling Sunday paper, amid claims that it hacked the voicemails of a murdered girl and the families of dead soldiers.

Cameron announced that he would set up a public inquiry led by a judge into the furore around the paper, as well as a second inquiry into the way in which the British press is regulated.

"These are the questions that need answering: Why did the first police investigation fail so abysmally? What exactly was going on at the News of the World? And what was going on at other newspapers?" he said.

Minutes after the prime minister spoke, London's Metropolitan Police arrested the 43-year-old Coulson by appointment at a South London police station "in connection with allegations of corruption and phone hacking".

The corruption allegations refer to alleged improper payments to police officers by the paper when Coulson was editor of Britain's biggest-selling Sunday newspaper from 2003 to 2007.

He remained in custody late Friday.

Police said they had also on Friday re-arrested Clive Goodman, the News of the World's former royal editor, one of the two men who was jailed in 2007 for hacking the voicemails of Princes William and Harry.

Goodman, 53, was apprehended at his house in Surrey, south of London, on corruption charges.

Police said they had also raided the offices of another British tabloid, the Daily Star Sunday, where Goodman had worked as a freelance reporter over the past year.

In a statement, the paper said officers had requested computer material linked to Goodman "to cross-check it with his activities in his News of the World role", adding that there was no suggestion he had acted improperly at the Daily Star Sunday.

The shock closure of the News of the World was widely seen as a way to quell the scandal and save the bid by his News Corp. for control of the satellite broadcaster BSkyB, on which the British government is due to decide.

Shares in BSkyB plunged 3.94 percent to 780.5 pence in late morning deals Friday, topping the fallers board on the FTSE 100 index.

It was also seen as a way of protecting Rebekah Brooks, the embattled head of Murdoch's British newspaper wing, News International, who was editor of the News of the World from 2000 to 2003, when some of the allegations also date from.

Cameron said of reports she had offered her resignation: "In this situation, I would have taken it."

Brooks however told the 200 sacked staff at the News of the World office on Friday that she felt "betrayed" and that she would try to find them jobs across the company, Sky News reported.

The last edition of the unashamedly sensationalist tabloid will be on Sunday, ending a long history of publishing sex scandals but also hard-hitting investigations including into recent Pakistani cricket match-fixing claims.

British newspapers on Friday mourned the passing of their scandal-hit comrade.

The Daily Mail ran with the headline "The Paper that Died of Shame", and bemoaned the "downfall of a fine British institution" while The Daily Telegraph opted for "Goodbye, cruel World".

Murdoch will reportedly replace it with a Sunday edition of The Sun, his daily tabloid, which is Britain's biggest selling newspaper.

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