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It's going to cost Paul McCartney roughly US$108 million to work it out. PHOTO: EPA

A jobless Hong Kong man, detained for weeks and denied bail in the city's nude celebrity photo scandal, was released on Friday following a public outcry that he was unfairly victimized by police.

Chung Yik-tin, 29, was arrested and detained in late January after police raided his home and accused him of publishing an obscene photograph of top city celebrity Edison Chen nude in bed with a string of prominent starlets.

But a local court decided to drop the obscene publication charge against Chung and release him, following the reclassification of the photograph by the Obscene Articles Tribunal as "indecent" - a lesser offence.

Chung's detention without bail, over the Lunar New Year holiday, provoked protests from Internet activists who said he was unfairly singled out by police.

To date, a territory-wide police investigation has led to nine arrests including Chung and several staff of a computer shop where more than 1,300 obscene images were stolen from Chen's laptop while it was being serviced.

Jane Fonda, right, says meeting Vagina Monologues author Eve Ensler, left, changed her life. PHOTO: AP

Hong Kong tabloids have devoted blanket coverage to the scandal, which has seemingly snared at least six stars including actress Cecilia Chung, singer Gillian Chung, Hollywood actress Maggie Q and Taiwan's Jolin Tsai.

Ex-Beatle Paul McCartney, 65, and his wife Heather Mills, 40, have finally agreed on a £55 million (US$108 million) divorce settlement, according to a newspaper report published Saturday.

The two parties had reached a verbal agreement on Friday on what is considered the most expensive divorce in UK history, the Daily Mail reported.

McCartney and the former model separated after four years of marriage in May 2006.

According to the paper, McCartney is to pay a £20 million lump sum to Mills and continue to make annual payments of £2.5 million until their 4-year-old daughter Beatrice turns 18.

In return for the settlement Mills had agreed not to talk about her marriage to McCartney.

The former model was planning to leave the UK because everyone in the country hated her, Mills' father said last week.

McCartney and Mills may have worked it out, but Britney Spears' downward spiral continues, as a court official ruled that the troubled pop star's father will retain control over her affairs for about three more weeks.

Jamie Spears was granted "temporary conservatorship" over his 26-year-old daughter's affairs two weeks ago when she was in a Los Angeles hospital for psychiatric evaluation.

Los Angeles Court Commissioner Reva Goetz on Thursday extended that conservatorship - which gives him control over her business, finances and some personal affairs - until March 10.

Spears' life has spun out of control since her breakup with ex-husband Kevin Federline with whom she is battling for visitation rights to their two sons.

In recent months the Louisiana native has been photographed wearing pink wigs and talking in a British accent as she traveled around Los Angeles with her self-styled manager, Sam Lutfi.

Last week Jamie and Lynne Spears, Britney's mother, said in a statement they believed "her life is presently at risk," and in court documents they claimed "Mr Lutfi drugged Britney" and controlled her life.

A more positive female role model, meanwhile, landed in hot water last week after she uttered an offensive word on a live television broadcast.

US network NBC apologized for itself and actress Jane Fonda on Thursday after she said "cunt" on the Today Show. NBC called it "a slip" and said they did not mean to offend audiences.

Fonda was on the program on Thursday with playwright Eve Ensler to discuss Ensler's award-winning work, The Vagina Monologues, in which women talk about their sexuality using frank language about their bodies and references to genitalia.

Vagina Monologues has spawned a movement called V-Day that aims to stop violence against women. It is celebrating its 10th anniversary this month.

On the Today Show Fonda explained how she first heard of Vagina Monologues.

"I was asked to do a monologue called Cunt, and I said, 'I don't think so. I've got enough problems,'" Fonda said. "Then I came to New York to see Eve and it changed my life."

The Today Show airs live on the US east coast, and the word was not muted or bleeped. NBC said for other US time zones, it silenced the word and covered the video with a still photo when Fonda uttered it.

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