Updated at 11:55 a.m. ET: LONDON -- British authorities on Tuesday charged an ex-aide to the British prime minister, a former protege of media mogul Rupert Murdoch and six others in the ever-widening phone-hacking scandal. Prosecutors accused those charged of key roles in a lengthy campaign of illegal espionage that victimized hundreds, including top celebrities Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.

The announcement was a major development in a saga that has transfixed and at times horrified Britons and one that shows no signs of ending. A senior police official told The Associated Press earlier this week that her force was investigating more than 100 claims including computer hacking and illegal access to medical records stemming from the scandal.

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Prosecutors said Tuesday that Andy Coulson, Cameron's communications director for four years until 2011, and Rebekah Brooks, who oversaw Murdoch's News International, would face charges of conspiracy to intercept communications.

The alleged offenses were committed between 2000 and 2006 when both served as editor of the News of the World, the salacious Sunday tabloid that Murdoch was forced to close a year ago amid public disgust at the phone-hacking revelations.

Among the alleged victims were two former British home secretaries, former England soccer manager Sven-Goran Eriksson, Hollywood stars Jolie and Pitt, former Beatle Paul McCartney and a minor member of the royal family, Lord Frederick Windsor, the son of Prince and Princess Michael of Kent.

Brooks and Coulson are also both accused of involvement in hacking the telephone of Milly Dowler, a missing teenage girl who was later found murdered in 2002.

Coulson: 'I will fight these allegations'
It was the revelation that News of the World journalists had hacked her phone that triggered a furor that engulfed Murdoch's News International and ultimately led to the closure of the 168-year-old tabloid.

"I am extremely disappointed by the [prosecutors'] decision today. I will fight these allegations when they eventually get to court,” Coulson said in a statement quoted by Britain's The Guardian newspaper.

"I would like to say one thing today about the Milly Dowler allegation. Anyone who knows me, or who worked with me, would know that I wouldn't, and more importantly that I didn't, do anything to damage the Milly Dowler investigation," the statement said.

Brooks sounded a defiant tone.

"I am not guilty of these charges," she said in a statement. "I did not authorize, nor was I aware of, phone hacking under my editorship.

"The charge concerning Milly Dowler is particularly upsetting not only as it is untrue but also because I have spent my journalistic career campaigning for victims of crime. I will vigorously defend these allegations," her statement said.

Others being charged are senior tabloid journalists Stuart Kuttner, Greg Miskiw, Neville Thurlbeck, James Weatherup and Ian Edmondson.

Also being charged is private investigator Glenn Mulcaire, whose extensive notes have been at the center of the scandal since it was first unearthed.

External link: Read the phone charges in full here

The maximum sentence for the phone-hacking charges is two years in prison or a fine -- or both.

'Astonishing development'
The development is particularly embarrassing for Cameron because Coulson was also charged with hacking the phones of David Blunkett and Charles Clarke, two former home secretaries from the now-opposition Labour Party. The home secretary is Britain’s top law enforcement official, roughly akin to an American attorney general.

"That is an astonishing development and I think that is almost inevitably going to rebound on Cameron," Steven Barnett, professor of communications at Westminster University, said. "That is going to pose some very, very awkward questions for the prime minister."

Alison Levitt, Principal Legal Adviser to the Director of Public Prosecutions, said she had concluded there was sufficient evidence to charge the eight suspects with 19 offenses over the illegal accessing of voicemails on the cellphones belonging to politicians, celebrities and sports figures.

Former UK PM accuses Murdoch of misleading inquiry into phone-hack scandal

News International had for years denied that phone hacking was widespread after the tabloid's former royal reporter and private detective were jailed in 2007 for the crime.

Poor judgment?
Coulson resigned in the aftermath, and took up the role as director of communications of Cameron's Conservative Party, helping to shape his campaign to become prime minister.

Critics say Cameron appointed Coulson in order to secure the backing of the journalist's former boss, Murdoch, and say the appointment showed a shocking lack of judgment.

Complete UK news coverage on NBCNews.com

The involvement of Coulson and Brooks -- a close friend of Cameron’s -- turned the long-running hacking story into a national political scandal that has laid bare the collusion between senior politicians, the police and the media.

Brooks, her husband and her personal staff have already been charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice over the hacking case, while Coulson has been charged in Scotland with perjury after he denied in an unrelated court case any knowledge of phone hacking.

Brooks, wooed by a string of politicians and prime ministers first in her role as editor of the News of the World and Sun tabloid, and then as the head of Murdoch's British newspaper arm News International, was one of the most powerful women in Britain, instantly recognizable by her long, curly red hair.

She was also close to Cameron, socializing with him over Christmas breaks, and both were embarrassed earlier this year when an inquiry into media ethics read out text messages sent between the two.

Rupert Murdoch not 'a fit person' to run major company, UK lawmakers say

Cameron used to sign his frequent text messages to Brooks with an affectionate "LOL", which he thought stood for "lots of love."

Damaging, but not fatal, to Cameron's political fortunes
Paul Farrelly, an opposition Labour lawmaker who questioned Rupert Murdoch and his son James as part of a parliamentary committee investigation into the hacking, said Tuesday's developments were damaging, but not fatal, for Cameron.

"My view is that what happens to Andy Coulson and Rebekah Brooks reflects on David Cameron's judgment in both the appointment of Coulson and in being seen to be so close to a certain newspaper empire," he said.

"Because it's been going on so long, it's in no way fatal to his premiership. What is more important to the survival of his premiership and the coalition is the economy," Farrelly added.

NBC News correspondent Duncan Golestani, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Updated at 10:49 a.m. ET: LONDON - Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was accused of being "a war criminal" by a heckler who burst into a courtroom as he testifed at an U.K. inquiry into media ethics on Monday. 

The protester, who gave his name as David Lawley-Wakelin, shouted that Blair should be arrested -- but only seconds later he was bundled away by security staff.

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He yelled at Blair, who is a $2.5-million-a-year adviser to U.S. investment bank JP Morgan: "This man should be arrested for war crimes. JP Morgan paid him off for the Iraq war, three months after he invaded Iraq." 

In response to the outburst, Blair said: "Can I just say on the record what he said about Iraq and JP Morgan is completely and totally untrue. I have never had a discussion with them about that."

Lawley-Wakelin describes himself online as a documentary film-maker working on a project called the "The Alternative Iraq Enquiry", for which he has traveled to Iraq.

ITV News reported he was being questioned by police, but later released.

Sky News reported that an investigation was immediately launched into how he entered the secure area of the court - an embarrassing breach of security less than a year after Rupert Murdoch was hit by a custard pie at a inquiry into the same subject at Britain's parliament.

Prior to the interruption, Blair was facing questions about his relationship with Murdoch.

Blair, who served as prime minister between 1997 and 2007, was the latest senior politician to appear at the investigation set up last year in the wake of a phone-hacking scandal when it emerged that reporters at the Murdoch-owned News of the World tabloid had routinely hacked into the phones of public figures. Other witnesses have included actor Hugh Grant, as well as Murdoch and his son James.

More coverage from Britain's ITV News

Blair is godfather to one of the powerful News Corp. chairman and CEO.'s children.

Ordered by Prime Minister David Cameron, the inquiry has tarnished Britain's elite by laying bare the collusion between politicians, the police and the media.

While Blair is no longer active in British politics, the inquiry may still prove uncomfortable as it examines issues such as his decision after stepping down as prime minister to become a godfather to Murdoch's daughter Grace at a ceremony on the banks of the River Jordan.

"Blair led the way in having no shame about courting Murdoch," said Ivor Gaber, professor of political journalism at City University. "He set the style and the standard and if you regard Cameron as the 'heir to Blair' then it's not exactly surprising that he followed suit."

The BBC reported that, giving evidence earlier in May, one of Mr Blair's former Cabinet ministers told the inquiry he felt the relationship had "arguably" become "closer than wise".

Murdoch told the inquiry last month that he had never asked a prime minister for anything.

Blair set the tone for his relationship with Britain's press when he flew to Australia in 1995 to speak before a gathering of Murdoch's executives who had previously used their British tabloids to vilify his Labour Party predecessors.

'Into the lion's den'
The decision infuriated much of his left-of-center party who saw the Australian-born tycoon as a right-winger who had helped to keep them out of power for years.

"People would be horrified," Blair said later in his autobiography. "On the other hand ... not to go was to say 'carry on and do your worst,' and we knew their worst was very bad indeed."

"The country's most powerful newspaper proprietor, whose publications have hitherto been rancorous in their opposition to the Labour party, invites us into the lion's den. You go, don't you?"

With the backing of Murdoch's top-selling Sun tabloid, Blair swept to power in 1997 and again in 2001 and 2005. But with an ever-increasing reputation for public relations "spin", he started to face questions over his sincerity.

"Tony Blair quickly became famous in Fleet Street for inviting in one group of newspaper people and telling them how skeptical he was about Europe; and then inviting in another lot and telling them how keen he was on Europe," Andrew Marr, a senior BBC journalist, told the inquiry.

"But the different groups compared notes, and his reputation was not hugely enhanced."

Much of that came to a head when Blair and then President George W. Bush agreed to invade Iraq, going against the public opinion in Britain.

Blair is likely to be asked why he spoke to Murdoch three times in the days leading up to the Iraq war and whether this had any impact on the fact that all Murdoch's papers supported the unpopular invasion.

He will also be asked whether his reliance on Britain's press meant that he did not properly scrutinize their role in society and whether any group, such as Murdoch's UK arm, News International, had too much control of the market.

"There was a desperation to get the Sun onside and to get News International on side, basically at all costs," Liverpool University's political professor Jonathan Tonge, told Reuters. "And if that meant sacrificing a serious analysis of the relationship and the health of the relationship, then so be it." 

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Updated 12:31 p.m. ET: LONDON - Rupert Murdoch was grilled at a high-profile public inquiry into media ethics on Wednesday, rejecting charges that he used his powerful British newspapers to influence politicians for the benefit of his business interests.

He rejected accusations that he used his media empire to play puppet master to a succession of British prime ministers, electrifying a media inquiry that has shaken the government and unnerved much of the establishment. 

What began with cases of voicemail interception at one of his U.K. tabloid newspapers has turned into a critique of how the British media operates -- and a deep look at the influence Murdochs's corporation, News Corp., has had on the highest echelons of government.

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Prime Minister David Cameron appointed judge Brian Leveson to examine Britain's press standards after journalists at Murdoch's weekly News of the World tabloid admitted hacking into phones on a massive scale to generate exclusives.

After taking an oath, Murdoch said he was keen to put straight some myths about him. 

"I have never asked a prime minister for anything," Murdoch said calmly when asked about his links to former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, one of his favorite British leaders. Murdoch also claimed he “never asked Tony Blair for anything” despite meeting that former Prime Minister 40 times in person.

Some politicians had expected the 81-year-old - courted by prime ministers and presidents for decades - to come out fighting, having been on the back foot for almost a year over a newspaper phone hacking scandal that has convulsed his empire. 

But Murdoch appeared calm and laconic, at times provoking chuckles from some of the 70 lawyers, family members and journalists packed into the Victorian gothic courtroom when he cracked jokes about the destruction of unions and a disgraced former British minister who lied in court. 

The man who has for years portrayed himself as an underdog, said he had simply tried to shine a light on the country on the behalf of the working classes. 

"I think that it is fair when people hold themselves up as iconic figures, or great actors, that they be looked at," he said. "I don't think they are entitled to the same privacy as the ordinary man on the street." 

But he admitted that his opinion had been carried by newspaper The Sun, one of his favorites for years. "I'm not good at holding my tongue," he said. "If you want to judge my thinking, look at the Sun." 

'Declare war' on News Corp.?
He also shed some light on recent British political history, saying that then Prime Minister Gordon Brown had reacted to the news that the Sun newspaper would be withdrawing its support for the Labour party by threatening to "declare war" on News Corp.  "I did not think he was in a very balanced state of mind," Murdoch said. 

Mr Brown later said Murdoch's claim was "wholly wrong".

Asked if as reported he had initially found Cameron to be lightweight, Murdoch replied: "No. Not then." He had also not found it strange when Cameron took time out of his own private holiday to meet him on a yacht off a Greek island in 2008. 

"I've explained that politicians go out of their way to impress people in the press," he said. 

He played down the influence of his newspapers on the outcome of elections, saying: "It is only natural for politicians to reach out to editors and sometimes proprietors, if they are available, to explain what they are doing and hoping that it makes an impression. But I was only one of several."

Prosecutor Robert Jay asked: "Are you saying that you are completely oblivious to the impact of election outcomes on your commercial interests? Murdoch replied: "Absolutely. I never let my commercial interests, whatever they are, enter into any consideration of elections."

Murdoch candidly described one of his own newspapers' most infamous front page headlines as "tasteless". After the Conservatives scraped a narrow win in the 1992 general election, The Sun, which had backed the party, declared: 'IT WAS THE SUN WOT WON IT'. "We don't have that kind of influence," Murdoch insisted, adding that he had been angry with then editor Kelvin McKenzie about the headline.

He said the notion of his influence over politicians was "a myth", adding: "How I treat Mayor Bloomberg in New York - sends him crazy. But, we support him every time he runs for re-election."

Rupert Murdoch will give further testimony on Thursday, when he is expected to face questions about phone hacking.

'Appalled'
However, in a written submission yesterday he said he was "appalled" to discover that lawyers for his newspaper The Times had misled the inquiry by earlier claiming claiming the title had never been involved in hacking, the Daily Telegraph reported.

It later emerged a Times reporter had hacked into a policeman’s email account. Murdoch said in his witness statement to the inquiry on Wednesday: “I am appalled that the lawyer misled the court and disappointed that the editor published the story.”

This is his second public grilling on the issue. The first was before parliament last July, supported by his son James and protected by his wife. This time he was alone -- although his other son, Lachlan, and wife Wendi Deng were watching from a distance in the public gallery.

Shareholders in News Corp. will be looking very closely at his performance. His task at the inquiry is to defend the world’s second largest media company – and, with it, his own reputation.

Evidence emerged last July that suggested multiple reporters at News of the World hacked into the voicemails of celebrities, the royal family and even a murdered young girl. Those revelations convulsed Murdoch's media empire and provoked a wave of public anger.

More than 100 lawsuits have been filed in the U.K., and a lawyer for hacking victims intends says he intends to file three more in the U.S.  Three ongoing criminal cases in Britain have resulted in a series of arrests.

Critics allege The Sun, endorsed Cameron during the 2010 election in return for support of News Corp’s deal to buy full control of broadcaster BskyB.

Murdoch was the first newspaper boss to visit Cameron after he won the election -- entering via the back door -- and politicians from all parties have lived in fear for decades of his newspapers and what they might reveal about their personal lives.

U.S.-based News Corp, owner of Fox Television and the Wall Street Journal, eventually pulled its bid to buy the 61 percent of satellite broadcaster BSkyB that it did not already own amid the intense political and public pressure over phone hacking.

Opposition politician Chris Bryant, who accepted damages from Murdoch's British newspaper group after the paper admitted hacking his phone, said the media mogul had dominated the political landscape for decades.

“You have only got to watch Rupert Murdoch's staff with him to see how his air of casual violence intimidates people," he told Reuters. "His presence in the British political scene has similarly intimidated people by offering favor to some and fear to all."

Murdoch's relations with prime ministers goes back decades: papers released this year showed that he held a secret meeting with then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1981 to secure his acquisition of the Times of London.

Tony Blair was godfather to one of Murdoch's daughters, Gordon Brown was a personal friend of the Australian-born businessman and Cameron employed as his personal spokesman a former Murdoch editor who was himself implicated in the hacking scandal.

During a parliamentary hearing last year, memorable for the actions of a protester who hit Murdoch in the face with a foam pie, he sat alongside James and spoke often in monosyllables but on occasion hit the table with his fist in frustration at the line of questioning.

Chiara Francavilla, NBC News in London, and Reuters contributed to this report.

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LONDON - James Murdoch defended his record at the head of his father's scandal-tarred British newspaper unit before a U.K. inquiry Tuesday, saying that subordinates prevented him from making a clean sweep at the now-defunct News of the World tabloid. 

Speaking under oath at Lord Justice Brian Leveson's inquiry into media ethics, Murdoch repeated allegations that the tabloid's then-editor Colin Myler and the company's former in-house lawyer Tom Crone misled him about the scale of illegal behavior at the newspaper. 

Leveson asked Murdoch: "Can you think of a reason why Mr. Myler or Mr. Crone should keep this information from you? Was your relationship with them such that they may think: 'Well we needn't bother him with that' or 'We better keep it from it because he'll ask to cut out the cancer'?" 

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"That must be it," Murdoch said. "I would say: 'Cut out the cancer,' and there was some desire to not do that." 

The 39-year-old Murdoch said that at the time he had no reason to doubt his subordinates when he took over at News International, which published the News of the World, saying he had repeatedly been told that nothing was amiss. 

"I was given assurances by them, which proved to be wrong," he said. 

Revelations that reporters at the News of the World had hacked into the phones of hundreds of high-profile people, including a teenage murder victim, pushed Murdoch's father Rupert to close the 168-year-old newspaper, triggered three U.K. police investigations, led to more than 100 lawsuits, and launched Leveson's inquiry into media practices. 

James Murdoch has found himself sucked into the center of scandal, with critics saying that he should have found out about the wrongdoing once he took over at News International in December 2007. 

The uproar over illegal behavior at the News of the World has already scuttled Murdoch's multi-billion dollar bid for full control of satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting Group PLC. He resigned from his post as chairman earlier this month "to avoid being a lightning rod," he said. 

Murdoch's relationship with politicians also came under scrutiny. 

The American-born News Corp. executive revealed that he'd told Conservative leader David Cameron that The Sun newspaper would endorse the Tories' election bid at a meeting at the George club in London on Sept. 10, 2009. 

The top-selling paper's endorsement was a blow to Britain's Labour Party — and critics claim that it helped secure Tory approval for the potentially lucrative BSkyB bid after they won the election in 2010. 

Murdoch denied the charge Tuesday. 

"I would never have made that kind of a crass calculation," Murdoch said. "It just wouldn't occur to me." 

Murdoch acknowledged talking to Cameron about it at a Christmas dinner in 2010 — after the Tory leader had been elected prime minister — but said it was "a tiny side conversation ahead of a dinner." 

Judge slams Murdoch's Sky News for illegal email hacking

"It wasn't really a discussion, if you will," Murdoch said. 

Cameron, who won power two years ago, has been forced to play down his contacts with the Murdochs and with Rebecca Brooks, a neighbor and frequent guest at his home in the countryside.

Rupert Murdoch, who is still chairman and chief executive of News International's parent company News Corp., is scheduled to appear before the inquiry on Wednesday. 

U.S.-based News Corp, owner of Fox Television and the Wall Street Journal, was thwarted in its ambition last year to buy the 61 percent of BSkyB, a major British pay-TV provider, that it did not already own. Amid the fire storm of scandal at the News of the World, it withdrew the bid.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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LONDON -- Journalists at Britain's Sun newspaper paid large sums of cash to corrupt public officials, aware the practice was criminal, an inquiry into press ethics heard on Monday, revelations that could prove damaging to Rupert Murdoch's media empire.

The Metropolitan Police's Deputy Assistant Commissioner Sue Akers told Britain's media ethics inquiry that the newspaper openly referred to paying its sources and that such payments were authorized at a senior level.

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"The current assessment is that it reveals a network of corrupted officials," Akers said.

The disclosures could damage Murdoch's News Corp if it gives ammunition to the FBI and other American government agencies that have stepped up their hunt for signs of illegality at the U.S.-based company.

"There appears to have been a culture at the Sun of illegal payments, and systems have been created to facilitate those payments whilst hiding the identity of officials receiving the money," said Akers, who is in charge of the investigation into phone hacking and police bribery.

She said one of the journalists who had been arrested has "over several years received over 150,000 pounds ($238,000) in cash to pay his sources, a number of whom were public officials." She said payments to public officials went far beyond acceptable practices like buying contacts a meal or a drink.

Akers, who made her accusations a day after Murdoch launched The Sun's Sunday edition, said journalists paid not only police officers but also police, military, health and government officials. One official received a total of 80,000 pounds ($126,912) over several years, she said, adding that police also are investigating if public officials were placed on retainers by newspapers.

Police and News Corp. lawyers are combing through millions of emails for evidence of wrongdoing at The Sun as well as the News of the World. Dozens have been arrested or pushed to resign because of the scandal, including two of Britain's top police officers who were accused of not doing enough to get to grips with the tabloid's wrongdoing.

More arrests are possible.

'Sickened and disgusted'
On Monday, Charlotte Church, a former teen singing sensation, received 600,000 pounds ($951,000) from News International, a News Corp. division, in a settlement resolving her claim that 33 News of the World articles were the product of journalists illegally hacking into her family's voice mails.

Despite her legal victory, Church sharply criticized Murdoch's empire, saying years of tabloid intrusions followed by legal battles had horrified her.

"What I have discovered as the litigation has gone on has sickened and disgusted me. Nothing was deemed off limits by those who pursued me and my family, just to make money for a multinational news corporation," she said outside London's High Court, where the settlement was agreed.

Murdoch, meanwhile, has said practices at The Sun have changed.

In an emailed statement he said: "As I've made very clear, we have vowed to do everything we can to get to the bottom of prior wrongdoings in order to set us on the right path for the future. That process is well under way. The practices Sue Akers described at the Leveson inquiry are ones of the past, and no longer exist at The Sun. We have already emerged a stronger company."

Akers was giving evidence at the Leveson inquiry set up by Prime Minister David Cameron in the wake of the phone hacking scandal.

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LONDON -- British police on Saturday arrested five senior members of staff at News Corporation's flagship newspaper The Sun, the company said, as part of investigations into alleged payments to police by journalists for information.

The payments investigation, dubbed Operation Elveden, is part of a wider probe into illegal news gathering practices that have rocked Britain's political, media and police establishments and last year prompted the closure of News Corp.'s Sunday paper, The News of the World.

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"I'm as shocked as anyone by today's arrests but am determined to lead The Sun through these difficult times. I have a brilliant staff and we have a duty to serve our readers and will continue to do that. Our focus is on putting out Monday's newspaper," Sun editor Dominic Mohan said in a statement.

A former News of the World executive, who requested anonymity, said The Sun's current deputy editor Geoff Webster, picture editor John Edwards and chief reporter John Kay were among those arrested Saturday. Sky News and other British media reported that chief foreign correspondent Nick Parker and reporter John Sturgis were also being questioned. News Corp. would not publicly confirm the identities of those detained.

A 39-year-old female employee at Britain's defense ministry, a 36-year-old male member of the armed forces and a 39-year-old serving police officer with Surrey Police were also arrested in an early morning raid, police said.

The Ministry of Defense declined to comment.

The latest arrests at The Sun, Britain's best-selling daily newspaper, come after the arrest of four current and former staff at the newspaper last month, raising questions about the publication's viability.

Saturday's arrests were the result of information from News Corp.'s Management and Standards Committee (MSC), a fact-finding group the firm set up in a bid to rescue its ravaged reputation.

"The MSC provided the information to the Elveden investigation which led to today's arrests ... News Corporation remains committed to ensuring that unacceptable news gathering practices by individuals in the past will not be repeated," New Corp said in a statement.

The MSC's work could lead to further damaging revelations about journalists bribing police that could prompt calls for the Sun's demise.

The once hugely popular News of the World was closed last year by Murdoch after accusations that its reporters hacked the mobile phone messages of celebrities and victims of crime caused a public outcry.

Murdoch to quit newspapers?
"This is huge. It will raise some very serious questions about the viability of The Sun .... You then start to ask questions about the extent to which News Corp and Murdoch in particular, may want to start getting out of newspapers all together," said Steven Barnett, professor of communications at Westminster University, London.

Barnett said Saturday's arrests were particularly damaging because they included current staff and were not related to historical actions by former employees, and also because they come after arrests and office raids at The Sun last month.

Murdoch also owns The Times broadsheet newspaper, which this year admitted that one of its former reporters had hacked a phone, and the Wall Street Journal U.S. financial newspaper.

Meanwhile, U.S. authorities are stepping up investigations, including an FBI criminal inquiry, into possible violations by Murdoch media employees of a U.S. law banning corrupt payments to foreign officials such as police, law enforcement and corporate sources.

Police said 40 people had been arrested in connection with three police investigations into illegal news gathering practices, but that no one had yet been charged.

Allegations of phone hacking at the News of the World prompted Britain's parliament to summon Murdoch and his executive son James to explain themselves last year.

Many inside and outside parliament have long accused Murdoch of wielding too much political influence through his newspapers.

The scandal's most high profile scalps so far include two top police officials, who resigned over the handling of initial investigations into media malpractice; Rebekah Brooks, a former chief executive of Murdoch's London papers; and Andy Coulson, a former Murdoch editor who became Prime Minister David Cameron's media adviser.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this story.

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Published at 12:15 p.m. ET: LONDON -- CNN star interviewer Piers Morgan refused Tuesday to disclose details about the most damning link between himself and Britain's phone hacking scandal: His acknowledgment that he once listened to a phone message left by former Beatle Paul McCartney for his then-wife Heather Mills.

In a 2006 article in the Daily Mail tabloid, Morgan said he was played a phone message left by the former Beatle on Mills' answering machine, describing it in detail and noting that McCartney "even sang 'We Can Work It Out' into the answerphone." Mills has said there's no way Morgan could have obtained the message honestly.

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On Tuesday, Morgan stubbornly refused to answer almost any questions about how he came to hear the message, saying that doing so would compromise a source. "I'm not going to start any trail that leads to the identification of a source," he said.

Asked by inquiry chief Lord Justice Brian Leveson whether he could supply any information to back the assertion that he had heard the recording legally, Morgan said he couldn't.

Updated at 12:10 a.m. ET: Morgan denies that during his editorship the Daily Mirror newspaper "suppressed" information that cell phones could be hacked in 1998 so that they could use it to spy on celebrities. "Absolute nonsense," he says. 

Updated at 11:50 a.m. ET: Morgan denies any knowledge of paying police officers for information. "I've never been aware of any evidence of that, no," he says.

Updated at 11:30 a.m. ET: "It doesn't necessarily follow that someone listening to someone else is unethical," Morgan says. "It depends on the circumstances in which you are listening to it."

Updated at 11:28 a.m. ET: When asked to discuss the source of a voice mail message of former Beatle Paul McCartney to his then-wife Heather Mills, Piers Morgan refuses.

He also defends the newspaper when it is asserted that the Daily Mirror was among the top offenders of the practice of phone hacking, saying,"You also well know that not a single person has made a formal complaint against a Daily Mirror journalist, so why would you say that?"

Updated at 11:06 a.m. ET: Piers Morgan says the Press Complaints Commission code of practice was displayed prominently in the newsroom at the Daily Mirror, where he was former editor, and says it "informed every editorial decision I made."

When asked whether an editor should have responsibility for his journalists, Morgan says, "The average editor is probably aware of about 5 percent of what journalists are up to at any given time."

Updated at 10:42 a.m. ET: Piers Morgan begins testifying at Britain's Leveson Inquiry into media ethics via videolink from the United States.

• For more details visit breakingnews.com

LONDON -- Former News of the World editor and CNN interviewer Piers Morgan will appear by videolink from the United States on Tuesday at a judge-led investigation into the ethics and practices of Britain's scandal-tarred press.

He is expected to be grilled about comments he has made about widespread phone hacking at tabloid newspapers.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch's News Corp shut down the News of the World in July after a public outcry over the phone-hacking practices by British journalists at the newspaper.

Morgan's appearance, along with a number of other witnesses Tuesday, has been widely anticipated and critics have been picking through old interviews and Morgan's autobiography "The Insider," in which the 46-year-old Morgan makes clear he knew of phone hacking as long ago as 2001.

• Story: Messages deleted by tabloid journalists? Not so fast...

In an interview for GQ magazine before the public scandal over the practice, Morgan said he couldn't get too upset over hacking because "loads of newspaper journalists were doing it."

And, in an earlier interview for BBC radio unearthed by one of his critics, Morgan appeared to go further, saying it was difficult to condemn private eyes hired to hack into people's phones "because obviously you were running the results of their work."

Morgan maintains that he has never participated in phone hacking or knowingly run a story based on an illegally intercepted message.

"I have never hacked a phone, told anyone to hack a phone, nor to my knowledge published any story obtained from the hacking of a phone," he said in a statement in August.

• Official website of the Leveson Inquiry into media ethics

Actors Hugh Grant and Sienna Miller, "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling and singer Charlotte Church are among those who have given evidence about press abuse, while executives and lawyers for Murdoch's News Corp have defended the newspaper.

From newspaper man to TV star
Morgan shot to national prominence when he was picked by Murdoch to run the News of the World at age 28. Under his tenure, the tabloid exposed Grant's liaison with Hollywood prostitute Divine Brown and Princess Diana's late-night phone calls to married art dealer Oliver Hoare.

It wasn't all down to good reporting: Morgan has acknowledged that bribes were paid to informants on rival titles.

• Story: Tabloid paid moles at rival papers for scoops?

In 1995, Morgan left the News of the World for the Daily Mirror. His time there was marked by scoops and controversy, including an insider trading scandal.

Among the newspapers to report it was The Independent, which said he allegedly bought 20,000 pounds ($31,000) worth of shares in a technology company the day before it was tipped in the newspaper's investment column. While two other journalists at the Daily Mirror were jailed, Morgan was not charged and kept his job.

However, his editorship at the Daily Mirror ended in 2004 when he ran a faked photograph purporting to show a British soldier urinating on an Iraqi detainee.

Morgan won a second life as a TV personality, eventually signing on as a judge of "America's Got Talent" and taking Larry King's old spot at CNN. So far, he's prospered. Ratings for "Piers Morgan Tonight" have been up 9 percent on last year's figures — good if not spectacular — and he appears to be reaching a younger audience.

CNN spokeswoman Barbara Levin said the network was "extremely pleased" with how Morgan's program was performing and the company has so far stood by its star even as the phone-hacking scandal threatens to draw him in.

'Despicable human being'
"So heartwarming that everyone in U.K.'s missing me so much they want me to come home," Morgan joked earlier this year amid demands he return to give evidence to the Leveson Inquiry.

Morgan's denial that he has had nothing to do with phone hacking is hard to square with a 2006 article in which he said he'd been played a phone message that former Beatle Paul McCartney left for his now ex-wife Heather Mills in the wake of one of their fights.

• Story: Emails warned James Murdoch of phone hacking by tabloid

"It was heartbreaking," Morgan wrote of the tape, saying that McCartney "sounded lonely, miserable and desperate, and even sang 'We Can Work It Out' into the answerphone."

How did Morgan come to hear the tape? He's refused to say, but Mills told the BBC in August that "there was absolutely no honest way" he could have obtained the recording. McCartney echoed her sentiment, saying he'd apparently been hacked.

Morgan's autobiography also abounds with tantalizing references to questionably obtained material: There's "a dodgy transcript of a phone conversation" and a celebrity's stolen laptop.

And when actress Kate Winslet demanded to know how Morgan got her cell phone number, which she had only just changed, Morgan shrugged it off.

"Look, Kate," he joked, "You don't get to be the editor of the Mirror without being a fairly despicable human being."

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The Associated Press contributed to this report.

LONDON - A British parliamentary committee on Tuesday published a sequence of emails which raised questions about the story News Corp's James Murdoch told to legislators about what he knew about phone hacking allegations involving the now-defunct News of the World and when he knew it.

In the email sequence, dated Saturday, June 7, 2008, James Murdoch was advised by Colin Myler, then News of the World editor, that the paper's legal position regarding a legal threat from professional soccer union executive Gordon Taylor was "as bad as we feared."

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Attached to this message was an email exchange between Myler and Tom Crone, the News of the World's principal in-house lawyer, in which Crone mentioned a "nightmare scenario."

The Independent newspaper on Wednesday published the email exchange between James Murdoch and Colin Myler, as well as the email exchange between Tom Crone and Colin Myler.

Crone explained that this scenario related to the fact that "several voicemails" on an email addressed to News of the World reporter Ross Hindley were "taken from" a phone used by Joanne Armstrong, a lawyer for the Professional Footballers Association union, which Taylor led.

The Guardian newspaper reported Tuesday that James Murdoch had written to British members of parliament, saying he had received the email chain over a weekend which was partly why he "did not review the full email chain at the time or afterwards."

The email sent to Hindley, which, in a reference to the News of the World's chief reporter, was headed "For Neville", is regarded by investigators and lawyers as one of the first pieces of evidence to reach the public domain demonstrating that phone hacking was a practice which extended beyond a single "rogue" journalist.

'Slipshod manager'
Executives of News International, the British newspaper publisher headed by James Murdoch at the time of the email exchange, initially claimed in public statements and testimony to parliament that phone hacking was limited to Clive Goodman, a News of the World journalist who was jailed in 2007 for hacking into the voice mails of aides to members of Britain's Royal Family.

In parliamentary testimony earlier this year, James Murdoch maintained that while he was aware of the existence of some kind of email, he was not informed in 2008 that it constituted possible evidence of widespread phone hacking by News of the World journalists other than Goodman.

• Story: James Murdoch steps down from newspaper boards

James Murdoch's handling of the phone hacking crisis has raised questions about his status as presumptive heir to his father, News Corp founder and chairman Rupert Murdoch.

Chris Bryant, a member of parliament for Britain's Labour Party who was a target of phone hacking, told Reuters on Tuesday that at a minimum, the email sequence newly published by the committee "says to me that James Murdoch is a remarkably slipshod manager .... He's been slipshod and News International have been slippery."

In a letter also made public by the parliamentary committee on Tuesday, James Murdoch told the panel "I was not aware of evidence that either pointed to widespread wrongdoing or indicated that further investigation was necessary." Nonetheless, he said he wished to "apologize" that this material had "only now come to light" in a late stage of the Parliamentary inquiry.

Tom Watson, another Labour Party member of parliament and a leading member of the Media Select Committee, was skeptical, the Independent reported, saying, "How can the company have just found this important email trail?"

• Official site of the Leveson Inquiry on media ethics

The Culture, Media and Sport committee is scheduled to publish a report on its phone hacking investigation sometime in the next few months.

A spokesperson for News International said the company had no comment beyond the statements made by James Murdoch in his latest letter to the Parliamentary committee.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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