Former British prime minister Gordon Brown yesterday accused Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers of employing criminals to obtain confidential information about his family and others.
Brown told the BBC that “the people that they work with are criminals. Known criminals. Criminals with records.”
He said that early in his time in office it appeared that the Sunday Times — part of Murdoch’s News International Group — had obtained confidential information on his bank account, legal files and possibly other material.
“I’m shocked, I’m genuinely shocked, to find that this happened because of their links with criminals, known criminals, who were undertaking this activity, hired by investigators with the Sunday Times,” he said.
Later yesterday, a legislative committee was scheduled to question senior London police officers about why they did not pursue a telephone hacking investigation at the News of the World two years ago.
The newspaper was shut amid a flurry of public indignation over allegations it hacked into phones, including that of a murdered 13-year-old.
Before yesterday’s hearing, Labour Party lawmakers called for the resignation of John Yates, assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police. He decided in 2009 that there was nothing more to investigate at the paper. Yates says he relied on advice from colleagues.
In 2007, a reporter and a private detective working for the News of the World were sent to prison for hacking the voicemail messages of royal family employees.
The scandal rocking Murdoch’s media empire continued to explode on Monday, with accusations that two more of his British newspapers engaged in privacy violations that included accessing Brown’s bank account information and stealing the medical records of his seriously ill baby son.
The Guardian said on its Web site that the Sun had illegally obtained details from the medical records of Brown’s four-year-old son Fraser, who has cystic fibrosis. The Sun broke the story of Fraser’s illness soon after he was born in 2006.
The Guardian reported that News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks, then editor of the Sun, contacted the Browns before publication to say that the paper had details from Fraser’s medical file. The Browns were extremely distressed by the story, friends told the Guardian.
The Guardian said Brown was targeted over a more than 10-year period while he served as chancellor of the exchequer and prime minister, and that some of his financial information was obtained by hacking into his accountant’s computers.
Murdoch’s reporters were also accused of paying Queen Elizabeth II’s bodyguards for secret information about the monarch, potentially jeopardizing her safety.
London’s Evening Standard reported that corrupt royal protection officers sold personal details about the queen — including phone numbers and tips about her movements and staff — to journalists working for the News of the World, raising questions over a breach of national security.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese