Prince Harry extends privacy claims against UK media

Prince Harry has begun legal action against more British tabloid newspapers, media and one of the publishing groups concerned said Friday, days after slamming the press for coverage of his wife.

"We can confirm that a claim has been issued by the Duke of Sussex," News Group Newspapers, which publishes The Sun daily and the now-defunct News of the World, said in a statement.

Britain's Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex(R) and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex(L) leave the Youth Employment Services Hub in Tembisa township, Johannesburg, on October 2, 2019. [Photo: AFP]

"We have no further comment to make at the current time," it added.

Sky News television said Buckingham Palace had confirmed the claims were regarding "the illegal interception of voicemail messages".

Britain's domestic Press Association news agency carried the same confirmation and said the Daily Mirror tabloid was also involved, without elaborating.

The development comes three days after Harry launched legal action for invasion of privacy against The Mail on Sunday newspaper after it published a letter from his wife Meghan.

In a stinging attack on the tabloid media, he said the duchess was being hounded by the press in the same way as his mother, Diana, princess of Wales, was before her death in 1997.

"My deepest fear is history repeating itself," he said.

A grandson of Queen Elizabeth II, Harry, who is sixth in line to the throne, has previously criticised the "racial undertones of comment pieces" about Meghan, a mixed-race US actress whom he married last year.