News International ‘tried to blackmail select committee’
Detectives carrying out the multimillion-pound investigation into illegal newsgathering techniques at Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper group have been asked to investigate whether it attempted to blackmail politicians.
The alleged plot centres on News International’s apparent efforts to warn off MPs on a parliamentary committee from disproving its discredited defence that phone hacking was the work of a single “rogue reporter”.
According to the former senior News of the World journalist Neville Thurlbeck, News International ordered the Sunday paper’s reporters to scour the private lives of MPs on the Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee in 2009. At the time, Mr Murdoch’s company was mounting what it now admits was a mistakenly “aggressive” response to allegations that the interception of voicemail messages was rife at its headquarters in Wapping, east London. On the advice of the parliamentary authorities, the Labour MP Tom Watson has now asked the Metropolitan Police to investigate the allegation.
When things don’t work out, doing business with Murdoch can be the kiss of death.
Major new allegations of privacy invasion, influence-peddling and perjury involving Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. continue to rivet the public in the United Kingdom. Murdoch, 80, founder of an empire instrumental in advancing the conservative agenda in the United States and worldwide, is portrayed at right in a photo courtesy of Wikipedia. A big question is whether he and his minions can confine the scandal primarily to the UK, and to losses of money and prestige. Or will the damage extend to United States holdings and political clout — and to dire liability for Murdoch family members who control his media holdings?
Rupert and James Murdoch conjured up a fictional report that serves as the fig leaf used to cover the naughty secret of News Corporation –- they never investigated phone hacking in general and they never tried to clean house.
