An Italian magazine shook off an extraordinary legal offensive by the British royal family Monday and published more topless photos of Kate Middleton, becoming the third European publication to do so.
The magazine Chi published a 26-page spread of grainy, telephoto-lens photos of the Duchess of Cambridge sunbathing topless in France as the royal family filed a criminal complaint and a civil action against the French magazine that first published the photos and the still-unidentified photographer who took them.
The royals are trying to stop publication of more photos by the French magazine Closer, which is owned by a company controlled by former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The same company owns Chi, which published its spread with the headline "The Queen Is Nude."
The Palace of St. James contends that the 200 or so photos of Middleton - apparently taken by a single paparazzo - violate her privacy and that the photographer trespassed on the private French estate where Middleton and her husband, Prince William, were vacationing. The editor of the Italian magazine disputes the trespassing allegation, saying the photos were shot from a public road.
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Some of the photos obtained by Closer were re-published last week by the Irish Daily Star. In response, the tabloid newspaper's co-owner, British media baron Richard Desmond, has threatened to pull out of the joint venture that owns the paper, which could lead to its shutting down (Desmond, ironically, earned part of his fortune from publishing adult magazines in Britain).
Although the photos are available to anyone with an Internet connection, no British media source has been willing to defy the royal family and publish them.
Only one British paper, the popular tabloid The Sun, owned by Rupert Murdoch's News International, published naked photos of Prince Harry in his Las Vegas hotel room during a strip billiards party last month. The Sun has ruled out reprinting the Middleton photos.
The photos of Harry probably don't raise the same privacy and public-relations concerns as those involving Middleton, British media sources suggested Monday.
The British press traditionally has respected the royal family's privacy when out of the public eye, as William and Kate were when they were shot on a well-guarded estate in Provence. By contrast, Prince Harry invited strangers with cell-phone cameras to his hotel room, forgoing some expectation of privacy.
