Jonathon Aitken

[Jan Klimkowski]

A lot of Guardian articles on Aitken's pompous hypocrisy:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/aitken

Aitken pontificated:

"If it falls to me to start a fight to cut out the cancer of bent and twisted journalism in our country with the simple sword of truth and the trusty shield of British fair play, so be it. I am ready for the fight. The fight against falsehood and those who peddle it. My fight begins today. Thank you and good afternoon."

The "trusty shield of British fair play" would likely have included getting his teenage daughter to perjure herself.

The Guardian's editor, Alan Rusbridger, last night wrote to Paul Condon, the Commissioner of Metropolitan Police, and the Director of Public Prosecutions, Dame Barbara Mills, to investigate what he described as 'a well-laid and carefully co-ordinated conspiracy to pervert the course of justice'.

Mr Rusbridger said yesterday: 'Jonathan Aitken seems to have impaled himself on the simple sword of truth. For three years he has lied to newspapers, lied to the Cabinet Secretary, lied to the Prime Minister and lied to his colleagues. Now he has made the fatal mistake of lying on oath to the High Court.

'Worse than that, Aitken - a former cabinet minister and a Privy Counsellor - intended to put his teenage daughter in the witness box to tell further lies to save his skin. This was the man who promised to use the trusty shield of British fair play.' He added: 'The case demonstrated how ineffective official procedures are in exposing dishonesty at the heart of public life.

'That role has almost exclusively been performed by the media in the past five years. But the libel laws make such reporting a dangerous and potentially prohibitive exercise. The Lord Chancellor should move urgently to reform the laws which make London the libel capital of the world.' Aitken also faced other allegations that he:

* Procured prostitutes for Arab guests at a Berkshire health farm, Inglewood.

* Falsely passed himself off as Inglewood's owner to conceal the identity of the hydro's Arab purchasers.

* Lied while a director of TV-am, and covered up a plan to give Arab investors control of the channel.

* Concealed his links, while minister for defence procurement, with a Lebanese arms dealer involved in an arms contract between a British firm and the Lebanese government.

* Became financially dependent on his Arab contacts, including Prince Mohammed, the son of King Fahd of Saudi Arabia.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/1997/...dpallister

Bankruptcy officials have received dramatic new evidence, which they are believed to be investigating, that Jonathan Aitken - the disgraced former cabinet minister who claims to be virtually penniless - had a secret Swiss bank account into which $4m was deposited by a Saudi prince.

Evidence of the existence of this account, at the Lausanne branch of Credit Suisse, has led to the postponement of an agreement that Aitken had hoped to make with his credi tors to escape from bankruptcy without paying much of the debt he owes from his failed libel action.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2000/...s.politics

A pious hypocrite.