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JUNE2012
PM's former aide Coulson charged with perjury
LONDON - Prime Minister David Cameron's former spokesman was charged with perjury on May 30, after denying in court any knowledge of widespread phone hacking by reporters at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World.
The charges against Andy Coulson, a former editor of the tabloid weekly, dam-ages Cameron because it calls into question his judgment in employing a man so closely linked to the paper which was under suspicion of obtaining stories by illegal means.
Scottish police detained Coulson at his home in London early on Wednesday and drove him to Glasgow for hours of questioning before charging him.
Prosecutors said his arrest followed his appearance before the High Court in Glasgow in 2010 over a News of the World story published when he was editor.
Coulson, Cameron's communications director from 2007 to January 2011, told the court he had no knowledge of illegal activities by reporters while he was the paper's editor.
He was arrested last July by police investigating phone hacking and bribery at the News of the World.
Perjury can in theory result in a life sentence, but sentences of a couple of years are more typical, a spokesman for the Scottish Government justice department said.
"This simply reinforces the questions that are hanging over the prime minister about his judgment in appointing Andy Coulson in the first place," said Ivor Gaber, professor of political journalism at City University in London.
"We now know that lots of people warned Cameron that this might not be an appropriate move," he added.
Coulson is the second ex-editor of the News of the World to be charged with a crime this month, embarrassing Cameron.
Rebekah Brooks, a personal friend of the prime minister who became a senior Murdoch executive, was charged on May 15 with interfering with the police investigation into the hacking scandal.
The charges hand valuable political ammunition to Cameron's opponents, at a time when the close ties between leaders of the current and last governments and Murdoch's lieutenants are being exposed at an inquiry into collusion between the press, politicians and the police.
Oppo sition Labour leader Ed Mliband, who has repeatedly attacked Cameron over his ties to Murdoch, has called Coulson's appointment an appalling error of judgment.
A current spokesman for Cameron and a lawyer for Coulson declined to comment.
PHONE HACKING
Coulson resigned as News of the World editor when his royal correspondent and a private investigator - Clive Goodman and Glenn Mulcaire - were jailed for hacking into phones in 2007.
He denied any knowledge of the practice but said he took ultimate responsibility for the crime.
FORMER News of the World editor Andy Coulson was charged on May 30.
Months later he went to work for Cameron, first in opposition and then in government, helping to craft Cameron's media strategy.
But when police reopened the probe into phone hacking, he was forced to stand down as it became clear that the practice had been widespread at the paper under his leadership, although he maintained he knew nothing about such activities.
While he was employed by 10 Downing Street as director of communications, Coulson was called to the Scottish court in December 2010 to answer questions about a front-page News of the World story about a Scottish socialist politician, Tommy Sheridan.
At the trial, Coulson claimed he had no knowledge of illegal activities by reporters during the time that he was editor of the now-defunct newspaper.
He said, "I don't accept there was a culture of phone hacking at the News of the World."
Sheridan was ultimately jailed for three years in January 2011 after being found guilty of perjury during his 2006 defamation action against the News of the World.
He had been awarded £200,000 in damages after winning the civil case but a jury at the High Court in Glasgow found him guilty of lying about the now-defunct tabloid's claims that he was an adulterer who visited a swingers' club.
REBEKAH Brooks former CEO of News International was charged on May 15.
The trial, which lasted almost 12 weeks, was one of the longest of its kind in Scottish legal history. The former Scottish Socialist Party leader represented himself after parting company with QC Maggie Scott.
He was convicted of five out of six allegations in a single charge of perjury relating to his evidence during the civil action at the Court of Session in Edinburgh.
His wife Gail was on trial along with him but was acquitted of lying to the court during his successful defamation action against the News of the World in 2006.
He was released from jail in January after serving one year of his sentence and vowed to continue the fight to clear his name.
The hacking scandal has proved hugely costly for Murdoch, who closed the 168-year-old News of the World in July 2011 after it emerged that reporters had hacked into a murdered schoolgirl's phone, causing a public outcry.
Murdoch paid off a string of people who brought claims against his News Corp over phone hacking, settling cases before they went to trial. News Corp took a charge of $63 million in May for costs related to the scandal.
It was also forced to abandon its biggest ever takeover bid, a $ 12 billion bid to buy the 61 percent of lucrative pay-TV group B SkyB it did not already own.
British recession deepens as euro zone woes mount
LONDON - A slump in construction output drove Britain even deeper into recession than initially thought in the first quarter of this year, raising the chance the Bank of England will inject more cash to prop up the faltering economy.
Britain is in its second recession since the 2007-2008 financial crisis, and the prospects for a recovery are cloudy as leaders in the euro zone, Britain's biggest trading partner, have made little progress in resolving their debt woes.
The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has indicated it is ready to pump more money into the economy, having paused its asset-buying quantitative easing programme at £325 billion in May, amid growing worries about a break-up of the currency union.
The figures will make uncomfortable reading for British finance minister George Osborne, who has vowed to press ahead with harsh austerity measures to curb Britain's debts, despite mounting criticism that spending cuts will stymie a recovery.
FORMER British PM Tony Blair was met with protesters upon arrival at the High Court in London to testify before the Leveson Inquiry into press standards.
Leveson Inquiry: Tony Blair defends Murdoch friendship
LONDON - Tony Blair arrived at the High Court in London on May 28 to give evidence to the Leveson Inquiry. The inquiry is investigating press standards and are now focusing on the relationship between the press and politicians following the phone hacking scandal.
The former British prime minister defended his friendship with Rupert Murdoch, saying it was "a working relationship" until he left office.
He denied doing any deals with Murdoch in return for the support of his newspapers and claimed they only became close friends once he left Downing Street.
Blair, who became godfather to Murdoch's daughter Grace in 2010, insisted the media tycoon never "lobbied him for special favours."
He told the inquiry he had not changed any policies to please the newspapers owned by Murdoch. He added he would not have become godfather to one of Murdoch's children based on their relationship in office.
His evidence was interrupted by a protester who burst into courtroom 73 from a secure corridor and accused Blair of being a "war criminal." Blair remained composed as the man was led off by security guards and the session continued.
During his decade in office Blair said he simply had a "working relationship" with Murdoch. He said, "I know Rupert Murdoch and his family far better today than I did when I was prime minister.
"I would never have become godfather
to their child on the basis of my relationship in government where meetings with Rupert Murdoch tended to be very much politics oriented and I knew the rest of the family only a little at that time."
He added, "It was a relationship about power. These relationships are not personal, they are working relationships."
Blair, who was Labour leader between 1994 and 2007, said the 1992 general election, which Labour lost, was "etched" on his memory.
Despite having once compared the media with a feral beast, he stressed that British journalism at its best "is as good as it is in the world."
But he criticised the genre of journalism "where because this line between news and comment gets blurred, it stopped being journalism, it's an instrument of political power and propaganda."
He said he was "absolutely determined" Labour would not be subjected to the same "media onslaught" when he was leader.
He also argued there was little recourse for anyone who had a complaint about the press other than libel. He said that it was "unhealthy" that certain parts of the media used newspapers as "instruments of political power."
He said, "I decided as a political leader that I was going to manage that and not confront it."
In his statement to the inquiry he said, "Politicians will often interact with them closely. Disentangling what is inevitable from what is wrong is a profound challenge."
Burberry to invest in new, bigger stores
LONDON - British luxury brand Burberry posted a 26 percent jump in profit as expected and said it would invest up to £200 million in new outlets and expanding existing stores in London, Chicago and Hong Kong.
The 156-year-old seller of raincoats and leather goods, said it made an underlying pre-tax profit of £376 million in the year to March 31. That compared to analysts' average forecast of £377 million, and £298 million made in 2010/11.
Revenue rose 24 percent to almost £1.9 billion with underlying growth rates
ranging from 15 percent in Europe and theAmericasto41 percent in Asia Pacific.
Luxury goods shares have wobbled in recent months over worries that Europe's long-running debt crisis could help trigger an economic slowdown in emerging markets such as China, where runaway demand for high-end goods has offset weaker trends in the United States and Europe.
Aquascutum, another upmarket British brand, fell into administration before being sold earlier in May.