A British Labour MP has accused Rupert Murdoch’s Sun newspaper of making illegal payment to US troops in exchange for a photo of executed Iraqi dictator Saddam.
During a Commons debate on the Leveson Report, Chris Bryant told the MPs that
The Sun newspaper, owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch, paid “a substantial sum” for the picture of Saddam in his underpants while he was being held in American custody.
The photo was run on covers of News Corp publications
The Sun and the
New York Post in May 2005.
Bryant said a laptop containing the photograph was “later destroyed”,
The Independent quoted him as saying.
Moreover, he told the MPs that Rupert Murdoch and his son James could face corporate charges over the phone hacking scandal.
The news came after Prime Minister David Cameron rejected Lord Justice Leveson’s call for a new independent press watchdog.
The Leveson inquiry was triggered by the phone hacking scandal that led to the closure of Murdoch’s 168-year-old tabloid
News of the World and the arrest of several journalists.
MOS/MOL/HE
