Prince Harry ends evidence with emotional claims in court (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: The Duke of Sussex has finished giving evidence in a privacy case against the publisher of the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday. Concluding the session, Prince Harry became visibly emotional, accusing Associated Newspapers Ltd of making his wife's life what he described an absolute misery. The Prince is one of seven high-profile claimants alleging unlawful information gathering by the publisher, which denies the claims. Let's go to Kasia Medeira, who's there at the court for us, and Kasia, just take us through the key planks of the Prince's evidence.

[00:00:35] Speaker 2: Well, Matthew, the Duke of Sussex ended the day on an emotional note. As you say, his voice absolutely breaking as he was describing how the defendants, Associated Newspapers Ltd, made his life an absolute misery. He said that throughout this process of litigation, it made his life worse, not better, and he called for an apology for himself and the six other very high-profile litigants, saying that it was awful that he was made to experience and go through all of this once again. The day started very differently, though. He was very combative. He was very keen to tell his story, even sometimes to and throwing with the KC that was representing the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday. My colleague, Namia Iqbal, was there throughout the morning. A very different ending to a very strong start from Prince Harry.

[00:01:32] Speaker 3: Yeah, he arrived in court really confident. He sat down. And as you were saying, his tone with the lawyer for Associated Newspapers, Anthony White KC, was very combative. He had an almost disdain in his voice as well. He was blunt. Mr White put to him, why did you complain about all of these articles when they were published, some as far back as 2001? And Prince Harry was quite blunt. He said, well, it's because of the institution I was in. And he uttered that famous phrase that's often associated with the royal family, never complain, never explain. And Associated Newspapers, their case is basically that Prince Harry had a leaky social circle. So all the headlines we saw of his private life were as a result of his friends talking about it, which Harry vehemently rejected. He said that so much of the information that was out there couldn't have come from them. And he put it down to unlawful gathering of information. And we saw that 23-page witness statement. And in there, he talked about how there was such a strain on his personal relationships with girlfriends of the past. He even went so far to say that one Daily Mail reporter was fully blown stalking him, just to quote that phrase. But yeah, a very emotional moment for him at the end. And you could see, I think, the toll that it's taken on him. We know that it's cost him financially and personally. We know that his relationship is strained with his family as a result. But it's always been, as we know, a real point of principle for Prince Harry to take on the newspapers in this way.

[00:03:04] Speaker 2: Nambia, thank you so much. Thank you so much for going through what we heard earlier on today. And as Nambia was saying, this is deeply, deeply personal for Prince Harry. This is, of course, his third major battle with a newspaper group. And there was a statement from Prince Harry's spokesperson who said that today's cross-examination was revealing in its weakness. It was assertive in tone, but it collapsed immediately under scrutiny from Prince Harry. Associated couldn't wait to get him off the stand, questioning him for just two hours, avoiding 10 of his 14 articles that he was going through. Prince Harry himself was saying that, today, we were reminded that it was the male group who is on trial and why. So a difficult day for Prince Harry. He has been here for the past three days. But now, in the next days going forward in this nine-week trial, it will be the chance for the other six high-profile claimants, people like Elizabeth Hurley, Sadie Frost, and also Dame Doria Lawrence, to take to the witness stand.