Mirror Ed Piers Morgan Resigns over Faked Pictures...

mike65

Breaking news -

I dont have a link yet!

Mike.

PaulHughesWH

Someone's put the screws on someone

Moriarty

BBC

Editor quits over 'hoax' pictures

Daily Mirror editor Piers Morgan has stepped down following pressure to resign over faked photos of soldiers abusing an Iraqi prisoner.
The Queen's Lancashire Regiment earlier told a press conference the Mirror had to apologise for running the pictures and endangering British troops.

A statement from the Mirror said it had fallen victim to a "calculated and malicious hoax".

The Mirror board said it would be "inappropriate" for Morgan to continue.

mike65

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Editor quits over 'hoax' pictures


The Daily Mirror published photos allegedly showing prisoner abuse
Daily Mirror editor Piers Morgan has stepped down following pressure to resign over faked photos of soldiers abusing an Iraqi prisoner.

The Queen's Lancashire Regiment earlier told a press conference the Mirror had to apologise for running the pictures and endangering British troops.

A statement from the Mirror said it had fallen victim to a "calculated and malicious hoax". The Mirror board said it would be "inappropriate" for Morgan to continue.

Speaking to journalists on Friday morning, Morgan had been bullish, saying he would not resign.

But in a news conference in Preston on Friday afternoon, the regiment demonstrated to reporters the aspects of uniform and equipment which it said proved the photographs were fake.

Colonel Black, a former regiment commander, said the pictures put lives in danger and acted as a "recruiting poster" for al-Qaeda.

The regiment's Brigadier Geoff Sheldon said the vehicle featured in the photographs had been located in a Territorial Army base in Lancashire and had never been in Iraq.

He said the QLR's reputation had been damaged by the Mirror and asked the newspaper to apologise because the evidence they were staged was "overwhelming".

Good faith

Morgan will be replaced on a temporary basis by his deputy, Des Kelly.

The newspaper released a statement saying: "The Daily Mirror published in good faith photographs which it absolutely believed were genuine images of British soldiers abusing an Iraqi prisoner.

"However there is now sufficient evidence to suggest that these pictures are fakes and that the Daily Mirror has been the subject of a calculated and malicious hoax.

"The Daily Mirror therefore apologises unreservedly for publishing the pictures and deeply regrets the reputational damage done to the QLR and the Army in Iraq.

"The paper will continue to cooperate fully with the investigation.

"The board of Trinity Mirror has decided that it would be inappropriate for Piers Morgan to continue in his role as editor of the Daily Mirror and he will therefore be stepping down with immediate effect."

Mike.

earwicker

If it was a hoax, and not simply dishonesty on the part of The Mirror, is there any speculation on who might want to fool the paper in such a damaging way?

mike65

Originally posted by earwicker
If it was a hoax, and not simply dishonesty on the part of The Mirror, is there any speculation on who might want to fool the paper in such a damaging way?

Good question, that as a sceptic on these pix is the hardest bit to square. It could be something as stupid as a bunch of boared squaddies in Wiltshire having deciding to have a joke and see if a leading anti war paper would fall for it, would an editor seeing the pix think "scoop!"
not "can we trust the origin?"

Mike.

capistrano

It seems that the pictures were a hoax, but I don't think the mirror was aware of that. Now maybe the debate can move off the hoax photos and back onto the real reports of mistreatment by British soldiers as reported in the red cross report. The hoax photos just allowed the British governemnt not to address the real allegations.

PaulHughesWH

Maybe the pics were a deliberate hoax organised and leaked by the British government in order to completely discredit any future genuine allegations. That sounds like a plausible argument.

Piers Morgan, when the pics were proven to be a hoax, would have no choice but to resign. Therefore, the British government would have killed two birds with one stone, by also removing one of its implacable media enemies.

Moriarty

... lol...

vorbis

do conspiracy theories never end? i'd say the Mirror assumed these were legit as the American ones had just been shown. The editor had to go though after making such a blunder.

Sand

It did seem odd how the British photos were so high quality compared to the American photos. I remember a commentator highlighting the fact that quality was a high on the British photos as it was poor on the American ones. Im not hugely surprised given that that they have been shown to be false.

Now on to Conspiracy Friday - how about the phots being hoaxed by a faction of the anti war movement to discredit Blair and spark public outcry for a British withdrawal?

Or more likely - they were just hoaxed by a bunch of conmen out to make some money out of people who were willing to accept these photos at face value.

PaulHughesWH

Of course he would believe they were legit. Which leaves huge room for the British authorities to take advantage of the situation.

The Brigadier

Glad to see Piers Morgan resign.

I really think he should face criminal charges. With something as damaging as this, he should have made a stronger effort to ensure authenticity.

This has directly endangered the lives of servicemen/women in Iraq.

PaulHughesWH

Originally posted by Sand
It did seem odd how the British photos were so high quality compared to the American photos. I remember a commentator highlighting the fact that quality was a high on the British photos as it was poor on the American ones. Im not hugely surprised given that that they have been shown to be false.

Now on to Conspiracy Friday - how about the phots being hoaxed by a faction of the anti war movement to discredit Blair and spark public outcry for a British withdrawal?

Or more likely - they were just hoaxed by a bunch of conmen out to make some money out of people who were willing to accept these photos at face value.

The latter is most likely, although you can never underestimate the crookedness of those in authority...

PaulHughesWH

Originally posted by The Brigadier
Glad to see Piers Morgan resign.

I really think he should face criminal charges. With something as damaging as this, he should have made a stronger effort to ensure authenticity.

This has directly endangered the lives of servicemen/women in Iraq.

How? You forget that the Americans ARE actually abusing and torturing people, so servicemen and women are in danger anyway. By the very fact that they invaded Iraq illegally in the first place, they are in danger.

While Piers Morgan made one hell of a blunder, I don't think he's the one who should be facing criminal charges. Why don't you look to Washington, London and Tel-Aviv for the real gangsters.

The Brigadier

WTF has America got to do with it?

The last time I checked America still was independant of the UK.

Just because Americans are abusing prisoners, does that mean that UK service personelle are as well? I don't see your logic.

mike65

Originally posted by PaulHughesWH
. Why don't you look to Washington, London and Tel-Aviv for the real gangsters.

How long have IDF been in Iraq?????

Mike.

PaulHughesWH

Originally posted by The Brigadier
WTF has America got to do with it?

The last time I checked America still was independant of the UK.

Just because Americans are abusing prisoners, does that mean that UK service personelle are as well? I don't see your logic.

In case you haven't noticed, they're all part of the one "Coalition of the Willing." What goes for America on the Arab street, goes for the UK.

>>"The last time I checked, America still was independant of the UK."
That's a laughable one. Ask the average Muslim in Iraq and you will see how little difference they see between the two.
Because the Yanks are abusing, torturing and killing innocent Iraqis, naturally its going to have repercussions for troops from other countries joined in the "Axis of Weasel."

It's called "throwing in your lot" with the wrong bunch.

The Brigadier

You seem to have a very skewed view of the world.

The UK and America are very seperate countries.

Ireland had representatives in Yugoslavia serving with the UN. There were crimes committed by other nations then, does that mean you tar Ireland with the same brush? No, I didn't think so.

And please don't go off-topic and try to talk about Israel. If you wan't to go down that road start another thread elsewhere please.

PaulHughesWH

Originally posted by The Brigadier
You seem to have a very skewed view of the world.

The UK and America are very seperate countries.

Seperate in geography maybe, but are you really so naive as to think that the U.S and the U.K. (and even Israel) have a seperate foreign policy? Or that unfree Iraqis hold the British or any other members of the Coalition in higher regard than the Americans?

Getting back to the topic, American abuse of prisoners will have repercussions for all occupying troops in Iraq. Whether Piers Morgan printed fake photos or not, the fate of British troops is sealed by the fact that they are stationed (and will be for a long time) in southern Iraq.

Dasilva94

Typical that a tabloid rag turns out to have more accountability than the Bush administration.

Unfortunately, the furore over the pictures has obscured the fact that the Regiment in question is still undergoing a number of serious investigations about the mistreatment and murder of Iraqis.

chewy

im confused i always thought the photos were fakes even as a vehement anti-war -ist.... although the first headline i saw with them was are these fakes?

the biggest difference is that there were no faces in them unlike the americans,

what the situation with so called antiwar tabloids, are they just trying to kick out the labour government...?

which paper did alot of publicity for the london antiwar march and made all the posters was it the daily mail?

and that scottish paper did so also the scottish em mirror, mail ?

shotamoose

Originally posted by chewy

which paper did alot of publicity for the london antiwar march and made all the posters was it the daily mail?

I think it was the Mirror.

I usually try to avoid kicking someone when they're down, but in Piers Morgan's case I'll make an exception. He really is a smug prick, and deserves to have lost his job for either (a) being so stupid as to print these pictures without seriously questioning their validity (all he had to do was show them to a couple of experts after all) or (b) printing photos he knew were fake.

The Muppet

He had to go. Why any editor of national newspapaer would publish such damaging material without being 100% sure of its authenticity is puzzeling. It appears that he let his personal opinions take precedent over making sure he was reporting the truth and that made his resignation inevitable.

bonkey

I'm curious...

all the people who are saying that it was right for Morgan to resign, or possibly even face criminal charges for publishing something so damaging without 100% certainty...

Do you also level the same demands against the British government? After all, the information pertaining to the WMD charges has been shown to be a mix of incorrect conclusions and some outright false testimony from people supposedly involved in WMD projects.

See, if Morgan was simply duped, or ran with something he wasn't 100% certain of the veracity of, then he did no different to what the British government did with the WMD claims.

So I'm just wondering.....

jc

vorbis

bonkey people were questioning the validity of these photos within 24 hours of their publicaiton. If Piers had spent even a day with a military expert examining the photos, he would have come away with significant doubts about the photos. The wmds issue is not the same in the sense that there was no way to contradict them so easily. People had opinions but no one had any easy way to disprove the wmd claims.

gandalf

Well personally I think that it was right to fire Morgan. Just looking at those photos you had to realise that they were dodgy, they were "too clean", even the guy being tortured looks clean, including his clothes. I suspect its a con job by opportunists taking advantage of the US pictures that came out to make a few bucks. What is interesting is that it does give the UK authorities some breathing space and the opportunity to cast doubt on any other allegations against their forces in Iraq.

Brigadier no one is doubting the fact that the UK is a separate country but to the majority of Iraqi's you are now an occupier just like your "Axis of Diesel" buddies the Americans. All the servicemen & woman serving over there no matter what country they are from have had their lives put in danger by the idiots in Abu Grabe (spl?) prison (and maybe even higher is a policy of torture is proven!!!).