Prime Minister David Cameron will address the phone-hacking scandal rattling the foundations of the British press, police and political establishments in a special session of Parliament Wednesday, hours after lawmakers slammed Rupert Murdoch’s News International and the police.
Parliament’s Home Affairs committee “deplored” obstruction by News International when lawmakers first tried to probe accusations of illegal eavesdropping by journalists working for Murdoch, and criticized police for failing to investigate the case properly.
The committee’s report does not mention either Murdoch by name.
Australia’s Prime Minister Julia Gillard also weighed in on the controversy Wednesday, saying the Australian arm of Murdoch’s empire, News Ltd., had “hard questions” to answer.
“When there has been a major discussion overseas, when people have seen telephones hacked into, when people have seen individuals grieving have to deal with all of this, then I do think that causes us to ask some questions here in our country,” Gillard said.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/blog/2011/jul/20/phone-hacking-scandal-live-coverage
12.00pm: Miliband asks three questions – about BSkyB, Andy Coulson, and Sir Paul Stephenson:
• BSkyB – can he assure the house the bid was not raised in any of his meetings with News Corp figures? Did he discuss it with the culture secretary?
• Coulson – Miliband runs through warnings about Coulson that Cameron has received or could have received, and media coverage such as the New York Times investigation into phone hacking. Why did Ed Llewellyn turn down the offer of a police briefing? Because the PM was compromised – “he was hamstrung by a conflict of interest”. Why did alarm bells not ring in Cameron’s office.
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/07/20/uk.phone.hacking.main/index.html
http://www.livestation.com/channels/10-bbc-world-news-english
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