Court battle over topless Kate
row as Irish editor suspended

The civil case, which was brought to seek damages and an injunction preventing further publication of images which featured in France’s Closer magazine, was launched last night in Paris as the publishers of an Irish newspaper which has also published the photos announced they had suspended its editor.

Ireland’s Justice Minister, Alan Shatter, said he was reviving abandoned privacy laws on the back of the scandal.

Arguments by lawyers for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Mondadori, the Italian publishing house that owns Closer, were heard at the Tribunal de Grande Instance in Nanterre. The court then adjourned its decision.

Chi, an Italian gossip magazine also owned by Mondadori, has published a 26-page spread with the topless photos featuring the Duchess which were taken during the couple’s holiday in Provence.

The French case got underway as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, continuing their Diamond Jubilee tour, were preparing to spend a night on a remote South Pacific Island resort in the Solomon Islands where officials were reported to have erected a makeshift fence to hide their thatched bungalow from prying eyes.

After travelling by aircraft, boat and war canoe the couple were welcomed to the idyllic island of Tavanipupu, an archetypal honeymoon destination and a world away from the furore surrounding the pictures.

Their £800-a-night bungalow, paid for by the Solomon Islands Government, had champagne and fresh fruits in the fridge and a candle-lit dinner awaiting their arrival.

Earlier, they were greeted on a tour of a cultural village in the Solomon Islands capital Honiara by bare-breasted dancers before flying to Marau Sound Airport and then boarding a boat to Marapa island where they experienced more South Pacific culture that left the Duchess exclaiming “this is amazing” as they caught sight of the singing and dancing islanders.

A St James’s Palace source said the couple “are being kept aware of the developments and directing a lot of the developments” in the legal case.

The Irish Daily Star, co-owned by media baron Richard Desmond’s Northern and Shell group and the Irish-based Independent News and Media, is threatened with closure for running the pictures in its Saturday issue and last night its publishers said it had suspended editor Michael O’Kane after an investigation was carried out into the editorial decision.

That decision was robustly defended by Mr O’Kane in a radio interview where he claimed the Duchess was a celebrity like singer Rihanna, that the photos were taken from a public road and highlighted a royal security issue.

News of his suspension was announced just hours after Mr Shatter said he would look to revive Ireland’s Privacy Bill 2006.

“It is clear that some sections of the print media are either unable or unwilling in their reportage to distinguish between prurient interest and the public interest,” he said. “It is perceived financial gain as opposed to any principled freedom of expression that for some is the dominant value. The publication by the Irish Daily Star in Ireland of topless photographs of Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, is a clear illustration of this.”

Ireland’s Press Ombudsman, Professor John Horgan, said his office had not received any complaints about the pictures.

The National Union of Journalists in Dublin criticised Mr Desmond’s threat to shut the Irish operation and accused him of double standards on the basis of some of his business interests, including the adult Television X channel.

Up to 120 permanent and freelance editorial staff are employed at the newspaper, a popular and profitable Dublin-based operation since its foundation in 1987.

Pat Rabbitte, Communications Minister in the Irish government, branded the closure threat hypocritical.

“I don’t think it was especially good taste by the Irish Star,” he said. “But I think there’s a great dollop of hypocrisy on the part of the (British) part-owner of the paper.”