the white house has blamed north korea for a "trail of broken promises", after president trump cancelled next month's summit with kim jong—un. pyongyang says the move defies the world's wishes and it's willing to resolve differences with the us "whenever, however". hollywood film producer harvey weinstein is expected to hand himself in to police in new york within hours over sexual assault allegations. more than 100 women have accused weinsten of sexually molesting them. he's denied all claims of non—consensual sex. yemen has declared a state of emergency on the island of socotra as a tropical storm intensified, flooding villages and capsizing boats. at least 19 people are missing. hundreds have been evacuated from villages, but rescue workers are struggling to access the more remote regions. now on bbc news, zeinab badawi talks to the former news corp executive les hinton on hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk,

with me, zeinab badawi. few people have got as close to one of the most powerful press barons of our times, rupert murdoch. for more than 50 years my guest, les hinton, was murdoch's right—hand man. he was a top executive at news corp during some of its most tumultuous times. well, he's just lifted the lid on his time at the corporation in a new memoir. how much personal responsibility does he bearfor some of the excesses at news international, like the phone hacking scandal in the uk, and did he have a career he can be proud of? les hinton, welcome to hardtalk.

thank you very much, zeinab. it's good to be here. what was it like working alongside rupert murdoch for more than 50 years? it was hard work. it was stirring, it was exciting, it was infuriating, and occasionally it was agony. but they were great years. over a long period of time. i began as a 15—year—old buying him his sandwiches in the morning, and i ended up running a large company in new york. so quite a meteoric rise from fairly humble beginnings. but you say in your memoirs, maybe news corp was a personality cult. maybe? surely it was or it wasn't? it depends how you define a personality cult. but he certainly dominated the company, and it's certainly true that describing it as a personality cult didn't actually occur to me until i'd left the company.

which may be, in and of itself, proof of the fact that it was. surely it must have occurred to you that this man with so much power, you know, that he — that it was a personality cult. i mean, you say that executives wanted to get close to him and very needy and wanting to always brush shoulders with rupert murdoch. that's true. he was like a... when he was in the office, people changed. when i was running the company in london, years ago, and i would announce to my executives, all very seasoned, very experienced people, rupert's coming to town, you would see this shiver through the room. and it was a mixture of apprehension and excitement. because they really loved to have him around, but he could be, for some of them, terrifying. terrifying, but also he made a lot of enemies. you say in your book that he basically bought off many of them. you'd be quite generous with their severance pay but he'd say to you, "les, be even more generous!"

i mean, he basically used his money to buy silence. well, that is, you're relating two things that don't really connect. my point about his generosity, he could be a tough employer, and he did dismiss people, but often i would, upon deciding someone should leave or upon he and i agreeing they should leave, i would take the action and i would describe to him what severance i was proposing. in those situations, and these would be editors or executives that hadn't quite worked out, he was always generous with them. it wasn't. .. they had nothing to be silent about. he was being generous with them. but you did also say that you and others fantasised about being able to have enough money so you could go and say goodbye. i won't say it, because it was rather obscene the way you put it. but anyway, just, "get lost," or less polite words, "rupert." it was, look, the fact is, there was a lot of pressure working for him. and i suppose there was something like a blitz spirit. and so, we would fantasise that if we had enough money and he was being especially difficult, that we would be able

to knock on the door and he would say, "yes, les," and is say, "rupert," and i'd use the curse that ended with off, and we all would have a good laugh. butl, i... so when he... there's a question of humour and some apprehension working for him. but i always had, for instance, a plastic gi helmet in my office with a razor blade, a plastic razor blade stuck to it. the joke was when he called me up and i knew his assistant at the time had a great way of giving you... she'd say to you, and she would say to me, "put your helmet on, love." and i knew therefore it was going to be a bad conversation. right. but it wasn't a question of living in mortalfear, it was a question of dealing, in your way, with the tension of working for him. a lot has been said about the fact that he has got very strong political views. to what extent do you think his newspaper empire reflected his own personal views?

would he pick up the phone to editors and say i think you should do this? he expressed his views a lot. but he was careful about how we did it. first of all, obviously, there is this talk that rupert dictated to all his editors what they would think and say. yeah. and that's not actually true with the way it's expressed. obviously he would play a part in choosing the editors, and he'd chose like—minded editors. that didn't mean that on occasions, many occasions, editors would do things they didn't please him. really? because i want to give you a quote which has been disputed by rupert murdoch, attributed to the veteran journalist anthony hinton, no relative, he asked rupert murdoch in 2016 why he was so opposed to the european union, because of course he backed brexit. yeah. and rupert apparently replied, "that's easy, when i go to 10 downing street," where the british prime minister lives, "they do what i say. when i go to brussels, they take no notice." well, i never heard him say that or anything like it. i mean, he cared a great deal about, he's very interested in politics and he's very interested in media and he's very interested in news.

you never heard him say that, but does it sound right? does it ring true? no, because i was, on many occasions, with him at downing street or at dinners with politicians and he would express forceful points of view, but it is a bit of a myth, in fact it's a complete fiction to imagine that he somehow was able, with some mysterious power, to dictate to these politicians what they should do, because he clearly didn't. but they went in and out, they all courted him. tony blair, who he famously backed. sure, sure, sure. so if he wasn't that influential or powerful, why would the politicians all be lining up to see him? well, because... it's a great question. and newspapers... politicians long since have attributed enormous power to newspapers to influence... and rightly so. well, that's debatable. that's what i would say. is it? because i have to tell you, just before you go on to that point. it's debatable, you say, but the labour leader neil kinnock when he lost the election to john major in 1992, this is what he said, he said,

"never in the past nine elections has the anti—tory, anti—labour press come out so strongly in favour of the conservatives. never has their attack on the labour party been so comprehensive. this was how the election was won." so, neil kinnock‘s mind, no doubt he lost the election because of the anti—labour press. well, then, he's saying if the press were more supportive of him he would have won. and i think, as with most politicians, it's very rare, and there are other examples more recent for a politician not to find excuses other than their own shortcomings. just as in ‘97, when we supported blair in that election, there was great talk about how we'd actually helped blair win. the truth is blair was far beyond the need of any type of assistance from anybody and had no need to be... but the newspaper, i mean the sun newspaper, which is the most widely read newspaper in the united kingdom, it said

after the defeat of labour, "it was the sun what won it." sorry, terrible grammar. but anyway, that's what it said. it was good sun grammar. yeah, it was good sun grammar. it was the sun what won it, so the sun itself is saying, look, you know, we've got all this influence and power. i know. they did, yes. but it's silly of them. because they didn't — no one knew. i mean, it was a close election. it was a very close election. and you could argue on the margin, that would have made some difference. but neil kinnock stood for election and neil kinnock lost. but the point i'm making is that obviously there's this overweening power of this press baron, rupert murdoch, and, you know, he's not elected. people are uncomfortable with that. if you look at his plans to take full control of the pan—european broadcaster sky, the uk regulator, britain's competition and markets authority, the cma, says the sky acquisition would give the murdoch family too much control over news providers across all media platforms and therefore too much influence over public opinion. yes.

you agree without? —— you agree with that? i agree that was what they said. but it's also true that the european commission, who are more historically strict on matters of monopoly and antitrust, they cleared it back in 2011. but what do you think? it's a fair comment, isn't it, it's justified concern? well, it's justified to be concerned. but if you consider that, to all intents and purposes, for 20 years, sky news, which is the principal news outlet he has in this country, for 25 years, his company has effectively been in control, they own 30% of the shares, and there's never been a murmur, a murmur about the fact... so you think it should go ahead. you think it should, obviously. i, i, i think that the argument... 0bviously with these deals there are are other issues to do with monopolies. sure, but it's this idea of concentrating too much influence on public opinion. yes, and that's a fair point. but honestly, i... so it is a fair point? you've made a fair point except, i think, with respect, you're fighting

an old battle. because the dissemination of news now, the atomisation of news opinions, the access of a wide variety of points of view online, through facebook, through google, i mean, there's a massive variety. so newspapers are no longer as influential as they were, obviously. sales are going down. nowhere near as influential. but, of course, what's replacing this concern, which is a bit dated, is the power and the anarchy of the internet, where things can be said to millions of people in this country from outside, from areas where there's no libel control, there's no slander control, there's no ethical control. sure, sure. that's the real modern argument, i think... which doesn't preclude you from being concerned about what the news corp is doing. no, but i think, but i think, i think some politicians in this country who have developed this passion against rupert are using, they're fighting an old battle. that's not the argument anymore, in my view. let's see how you rose to become one of rupert murdoch's most trusted lieutenants. i mean, you had a very itinerant early life. you were born in bootle

in the north of england. your father was a sergeant in the army and you moved around all over the world, libya, egypt, singapore, germany, and so on. and newspapers, of course, in those days, were the most important source of news, there was the radio as well. did you even, at that very early age, realise how much influence and power they could hold? yes. i write a lot about this in my book and it's called the bootle boy because i began there. it's called the bootle boy: an untidy life in news. an untidy life in news. and i could have said extremely untidy there, but i thought untidy would do. it's true. i became very interested in news when i was 11 or 12 and i read a couple of great crusading articles, one in the daily mirror involving a woman called ruth ellis who was hanged for having... that's a british woman. a british... yeah. she was hanged in britain for having murdered her boyfriend. there was a massive feeling against capital punishment in this

country when it happened. and i remember reading the passion of that and feeling really sort of moved by it. and i think that's the first time i thought how powerful newspapers could be. and how much i wanted to work for them. and i was 11 or 12 years old. and those were the days when there were more than two or three newspapers in virtually every single household in the country and only two television stations. so there was much more power and many more newspapers in those days. so when you were 15, your family moved to australia. that's when you got your first job on a newspaper, the news in adelaide. as a copyboy. yes. and you say in your memoir that newspapers are a high functioning dictatorship. yes. what do you mean by that? i mean that unlike any other institution or operation that i'm familiar with, because of the deadlines, i suppose a battle commander would compare, because so many quick decisions need to be made, that there can only be so much room for democratic process. it's the same in television,

when there's a late—night show and a decision about what to air or not to air, someone‘s got to make that decision. and so because of that need for speed, then the authority and obedience in a newspaper gravitates to the man at the top. all right then, and then in the mid... that's when you met rupert murdoch, by the way, as you said, when you were on the news. but in the mid—70s, you got a job in murdoch's new operation in new york. and you say "we newcomers were devoted to the boss, we moved from business to business, taking over newspapers, buying magazines, moving into television, and all the while professing not to give a damn about what the rest it was a very populist approach, not pulitzer prize seeking kind ofjournalism, wasn't it? it was very... i'm very happy with the description of that. i was there along with others. the american media, the american press were then, even more than they are now, they still are, are very self—importa nt.

we came in with a sydney and fleet street style of popular newspapers and approach to popular newspapers, and they absolutely loathed it. and while there were many matters on which they had good cause to loathe it, there was still something quite wonderful about upsetting them so much. but that came at a cost, that kind of approach to journalism, because in 1995 you returned to london to write for news international, the uk division arm of news corp and that really brought about a real low in your career. i am talking about the phone hacking scandal in the uk and the terrible case of the young schoolgirl, milly dowler, who was murdered in 2002, her phone had been hacked by a reporter from news of the world and messages were being deleted and so it gave hope to herfamily that she was somehow still alive, when of course she had been murdered. it later emerged that hundreds of people had had their phones hacked and there were criminal prosecutions and so on,

surely that was the lowest point of your career? it was a very bad period. milly dowler‘s e—mails — it was a terrible travesty to have happened, but there never any evidence that her voice mails were deleted. that was found out to not be true. she was hacked and many others were. it was the awful gratuitousness of that that created a great firestorm that resulted in the scandal and there is no excuse to it. if you are somebody at the top of the organisation, surely the buck stops with you? it was said that this culture permeated from the top of the organisation and speaks volumes about the lack of corporate governance news corp and news international. you were at that top. i was and i don't agree with that. the fact was, in the end,

the trouble with talking about this, i have to be very careful in not diminishing the crimes that took place, but the number of people involved in it, however widespread, in relation to the number of journalists and others who had worked at news corp in london — we had the sunday times, the literary supplement, there were loads. in the end, eight people were found guilty to phone hacking and we employed 3000. that is eight, there was a lot of public outrage and rupert murdoch had a pie thrown in his face. well, yes. that is fair enough, the point is what i'm trying to say is the politicians who compiled the report, i can discuss this if you want, they wanted to blight the entire organisation. how did you feel at the top of it?

sick, and i resigned. i was long left when this happened, but i resigned from the company. as other executives also tendered their resignations? some did and others didn't. the fact is, i knew nothing about it, hindsight is a great place to view everything perfectly. i did everything that i thought i should do at the time and that this happened. but it happened on my watch and i left. it was a huge corporate failing of corporate governance, you accept that. i accept that it should not have happened, but i don't accept that there were some corrupt acceptance or acknowledgement that this sort of thing happened. it isn't true. it an ignominious end to an illustrious career, was it such a blight on your career that you could say i am proud of my career but this episode overshadows everything else?

i was very proud of my career and the work that i did and i think it is fair to agree it was not the way to end it. i was 67 years old and i along with many other people, were caught in this storm and i would much rather it hadn't happened. it did and i don't feel ashamed of my career, i feel ashamed of that episode. you said you feel like a castaway in a hurricane, but you feel you were briefed by people inside news corp, did that come from the top? if i knew where it came from than my book would have said so. but i don't really believe that it was rupert... it could have been, you don't know. i don't know who it was. i don't believe it because i know how he works. he asked me not to resign when i offered to and that i accepted it. i don't think it was rupert murdoch, but i don't know who it was. you imply that that kind

of journalism, tabloid approach, the kind of journalism that draws criticisms, is that a thing of the past for news corp? it's not really, is it? hang on. when you say think of the past, you are implying perhaps in the minds of some people watching this that it was a permeating culture and it wasn't. it wasn't like that. there was a knot of people who did a lot of misdeeds by hacking people's voicemails. you are a former chairman and chief executive of fox tv stations, fox news channel was launched in 1996, not by you because apparently you didn't have the right vision for it. a lot of criticism now about fox news because people say it parades opinion and comment masquerading as fact and caters to people's prejudices and so on. that is still going on.

no, see, you are quoting what commercial rivals of fox news say and then imply it as fact. i lived most of my time in new york and watch the news bulletins there, that fox is a devoted the trumpian operation. i personally don't agree with that. i think that the president of the united states is some kind of a freak. i am sure that he will would not accept that description of him as a freak. but i am happy to argue with him. at the same time, if you watch cnn, they are as fiercely anti—trump as fox is pro—trump. you can look at it and you can decide who you believe more. ifind it difficult, compared with here in london where you can sit down and listen to news and get a proper, coherent balance of information. because of trump,

you don't get that. you are saying, i am just parroting what critics of fox news say — but i wanted to let you know what us army colonel ralph peters, who served as a military analyst for sometime for fox news and he left. yes. he said he felt compelled to explain his departure in march. he says "today i feel fox news is fostering corrosive and unjustified paranoia among viewers." yes. that is somebody who contributes to fox news. who contributed, yes. yes, and left. he feels that it has degenerated from providing a legitimate and much—needed outlet for conservative voices to morphing into a mere propaganda machine for a destructive and ethically ruinous administration. it is a very subjective statement. very colourful and very subjective.

he was just a critic of — it isn'tjust the left of centre critics of fox news who are saying that. sure. i can spend all night with you defending rupert murdoch, but it isn't really what i want to do because in talking about rupert, i can cite many failings and shortcomings. you were the chairman chief executives of fox tv stations. that was long ago. for that view, you can go online, on social media and hear many counter views. i think a lot of what he says has some value, but i don't, it is not an objective, loathing fox news and loving cnn is not an objective standpoint because they do the same, except the opposite. people are increasingly getting their news not from newspapers but from other sources. do you accept that you have been

part of a dying industry and that today, we are talking about rupert murdoch, but actually it is not him who matters as much now, it is mark zuckerberg and facebook. i think there is a dramatic atomisation of news and information taking place and you can sit now here with a laptop and every country in the world that sees this, you can go to their newspapers and check what people think, what australians think about japan and what china thinks about north korea. you can do all of those things, whereas once upon a time you get the evening bulletin before breakfast tv, before cable channels, now you can basically sit and you have and the in the palm of your hand you have infinity. it may be destroying business models of fox and these newspapers but it is, from the point of people like us as consumers — fantastic. les hinton, thank you very much for coming on hardtalk. thank you. hello.

the forecast for the bank holiday weekend is a somewhat messy one. yes, there will be a lot of warmth. there will be some rather muggy conditions as well and some spells of spring sunshine but also some thundery downpours, and predicting exactly where and when the worst of those will turn up is going to prove quite tricky. you can see the way these thunderclouds have been spreading quite eratically northwards across the western side of europe, and that is the sort of weather pattern that is going to continue through the weekend. here is one clump of heavy thunderstorms and downpours drifting across the midlands, wales and up into northern england. a lot of cloud in the south as we start off the day, but that cloud should break up into some spells of sunshine. still the chance of one or two showers and thunderstorms. the main wet weather will be in wales and northern england. for northern ireland and scotland, the best of the sunshine, although for some north—eastern coastal parts of scotland, there will be some mist, murk and low cloud hanging around at times. as far as temperatures go, a bit disappointing. in the sunshine, highs around 22 or 23 degrees. during friday night, we will see these showers and storms start to drift further west,

they will start to fizzle as they go. a lot of cloud left behind. some rather misty and murky conditions to take us into saturday. temperatures around 12 to 1a degrees. saturday starts off with a lot of cloud, that should break up to some sunshine, particularly across the northern half of the british isles. across the south, the increasing chance that we will see some really vicious thunderstorms breaking up. they will be quite hit and miss. the best of the sunshine, those temperatures creeping up 21 to 2a or 25 degrees because we are going to be importing this very warm air from the new continent. what we are also going to be bringing up from the south is clusters of heavy, thundery downpours. you can see the way these frontal systems will continue to drift in. it looks likely that on sunday, we could see particularly intense downpours, particularly down towards the south—west. here, a quieter weather story with some spells of sunshine and some pleasant warmth

at 18 to 2a degrees. further south, there will be some spells of sunshine but quite a muggy feel and the threat of some really intense downpours and thunderstorms, particularly on sunday. hello. hello, this is the briefing. i'm samantha simmonds. our top story: hollywood film producer harvey weinstein is expected to hand himself in to police in new york within hours following allegations of sexual assault. no north korea summit. pyongyang says president trump's pull out defies the world's wishes. football fans flock to kiev ahead of the champions league final. but, for some, prices and travel problems make it a step too far.

in business: privacy revolution. new laws come in across europe, giving citizens power over their own personal data and threatening huge fines for firms that abuse it.