EXECUTIVES IN Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation are conspiring to damage The Sunin a bid to avoid corruption charges against top figures in the US, said senior journalists at the tabloid.
Associate editor Trevor Kavanagh, who has been close to Mr Murdoch for nearly 30 years, said journalists on the title believe they are “under siege”.
Under US law, senior News Corporation executives, including Rupert Murdoch and his son James, could be prosecuted under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act if it can be shown that they had knowledge of corruption, or of attempts to stop disclosure of corruption.
Following the Milly Dowler phone-hacking scandal concerning the News of the World last year, News Corporation set up the Management and Standards Committee (MSC) to investigate the conduct of journalists on the titles of its UK subsidiary, News International.
Mr Kavanagh said that some executives, not those working directly for News International, are “actually boasting that they are sending information to police that has put . . . people . . . into police cells”.
In one case, it is alleged that one of The Sunjournalists arrested at the weekend, in dawn raids on their homes, was detained after the MSC sent a copy of a receipt for a £50 lunch with two police officers.
Since its creation, the MSC has built an archive of 300 million emails from News International titles, some of which were thought to have been destroyed, although there are conflicting reports as to whether the arrests have come solely on the back of information given to police.
Having written an article in The Sunyesterday, Mr Kavanagh, former political editor of the paper, spent much of the day touring broadcast studios where he repeatedly attacked the MSC for handing information to the police.
So far, however, it is not clear if the decision to publish Mr Kavanagh’s article, and his subsequent condemnation of high-ranking executives, was approved – if only as a vehicle to vent staff anger at events, or whether it marks a breakdown of discipline.
“I think it’s fair to say that there is unease about the way that some of the best journalists in Fleet Street have ended up being arrested on evidence that the MSC has handed to the police,” he said on BBC Radio 4’s World at One programme.
Mr Murdoch is due in London for a visit that was arranged before 10 Sunjournalists were questioned about allegations that they had paid police and other public officials for information.
He said at the weekend that The Sunwill not be closed, unlike the News of the World.
