LONDON — Rupert Murdoch touched down in London on Sunday to take charge of his media empire’s phone-hacking crisis as his best-selling Sunday tabloid, the News of the World, published its last. The scandal lives on despite his sacrifice of the 168-year-old paper at the heart of it.
The scrapping of the News of the World has not tempered anger over improprieties by journalists working for Murdoch, and his $19 billion deal to take full control of satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting remains in jeopardy.
The 80-year-old News Corp. chief executive was seen reading the paper’s last issue in a red Range Rover as he was driven to the east London offices of his U.K. newspaper division, News International.
Later, at his London apartment, he met with News International’s chief executive, Rebekah Brooks, who led News of the World when reporters committed some of the most egregious ethical lapses.
Murdoch has publicly backed Brooks, who insists she had no knowledge of wrongdoing. He put his hand on her shoulder as they left the residence about an hour after she arrived; they smiled for photographers before walking to a hotel for a meal.
The drama has expanded at breakneck pace following allegations that News of the World journalists paid police for information and hacked into the voice mails of young murder victims and the grieving families of dead soldiers.
Three people have been arrested, including Prime Minister David Cameron’s former communications chief.
Closing down the News of the World was seen by some as a desperate attempt to stem negative fallout from the hacking scandal and save Murdoch’s $19 billion bid to get full ownership of BSkyB, in which he already holds a stake. The British government has signaled that that deal will be delayed because of the crisis.
British opposition leader Ed Miliband warned that a Murdoch takeover of BSkyB should not be allowed while the phone-hacking investigation is ongoing, and he vowed to push for a parliamentary vote if Cameron fails to act.
“When the public have seen the disgusting revelations that we have seen this week, the idea that this organization, which engaged in these terrible practices, should be allowed to take over BSkyB, to get that 100 percent stake, without the criminal investigation having been completed . . . frankly, that just won’t wash with the public,” he told the BBC.
The scandal exploded last week after it was reported that the News of the World had hacked the mobile phone of 13-year-old murder victim Milly Dowler in 2002 while her family and police were desperately searching for her.
News of the World operatives reportedly deleted some messages from the phone’s voice mail, giving the girl’s parents false hope that she was still alive.
Cameron has conceded that politicians developed too cozy a relationship with the tabloid press, has called for a new media-regulation system and pledged a public inquiry into what went wrong. His former communications chief, Andy Coulson, is a former editor of the News of the World and was one of three men arrested last week as part of a police investigation into the phone-hacking and corruption allegations.
