Murdoch 'pushed Blair over Iraq'

Responding to Alastair Campbell's earlier comments, the Former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell said: "Why on earth would Rupert Murdoch ring Tony Blair three times in the week before the invasion of Iraq if he was not trying to influence the British prime minister?

"Mr Murdoch's intervention was clearly designed to steer Tony Blair in the direction of those in the United States, including [US President] Bush, who were determined to take action against Saddam Hussein and to ignore illegality."

Alastair Campbell has told the BBC's Today programme that Tony Blair's views on Iraq were well known and that Rupert Murdoch did not influence them. He said:

Tony Blair's former spokesman Alastair Campbell has sought to "contextualise" comments in his diary that suggest Rupert Murdoch lobbied the Prime Minister over the Iraq war.

Writing in his blog, Mr Campbell says he supports New Corporation's point that he has no evidence to back up his claim, pointing out that the comments were only a small aside in his account of a busy day:

He also writes that Mr Murdoch's comments were "nothing inappropriate".

Rupert Murdoch's company News Corporation has released a statement denying the allegation that Mr Murdoch lobbied Former Prime Minister Tony Blair over the Iraq War.

On March 11 2003 in his book Burden of Power, Countdown to Iraq, which is being serialised by The Guardian, Campbell wrote: "(Tony Blair) took a call from Murdoch who was pressing on timings, saying how News International would support us, etc.

"Both TB and I felt it was prompted by Washington, and another example of their over-crude diplomacy. Murdoch was pushing all the Republican buttons, how the longer we waited the harder it got."

The following day he added: "TB felt the Murdoch call was odd, not very clever."

Mr Campbell claims in 2002 Downing Street believed the then chancellor Gordon Brown was "hell-bent on TB's destruction" as a result of his behind-the-scenes manoeuvring.

The former No 10 communications director also suggests that his former boss believed the Prince of Wales had been "captured by a few very right-wing people", following the publication of leaked letters he wrote about a US-style compensation culture in 2002.

Rupert Murdoch was part of an "over-crude" attempt to push Tony Blair into action in Iraq, Alastair Campbell has claimed.

In the last volume of his diaries being serialised by the Guardian, Mr Blair's former spin doctor said the media mogul made a telephone call warning about the dangers of delaying Britain's involvement.

The claim comes days after questions were raised about Mr Murdoch's evidence to the Leveson Inquiry into media ethics that he had "never asked a prime minister for anything".

Ex-Tory PM Sir John Major said Murdoch had asked him to change his European policy in return for the support of his papers.

Mr Campbell's book, The Burden of Power, Countdown to Iraq, suggests Mr Murdoch made moves to help US Republicans the week before the Commons vote in 2003 on deploying British troops to Iraq.