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But he said his government had not acted in Murdoch's businessinterests. "Actually we decided more stuff against the Murdoch interest thanin favor of it," Blair said. "Pressure from him was more politicalthan commercial." "He didn't lobby me on media stuff," Blair said, adding: "That'snot to say that we didn't know what his position was. But the bulkof our conversations were about politics." He confirmed that he was the godfather of one of Murdoch'schildren, but said that was because his relationship with the mediamagnate changed once he was no longer prime minister. "I would never have become godfather to one of his children on thebasis of my relationship with him while I was in office," he said,but their relations became "easier" after he stepped down in 2007. He briefly addressed his trip to meet Murdoch on Hayman Island in1995, while he was campaigning to become prime minister, and agreedwith his former aide Alastair Campbell that he was "angered" tohave to do it. Murdoch's best-selling Sun tabloid famously switched allegiancefrom the Conservative party to Blair's Labour party before the 1997election that swept Blair into power. But Murdoch insisted stronglythat there had been no quid pro quo with Blair for the support ofhis papers in 1997. "I, in 10 years in his power there, never asked Tony Blair for anyfavors and never received any," Murdoch said in April, pounding hishand on the table for emphasis. On Monday, Blair said he believed Murdoch himself made thedecisions about who his British newspapers supported, notunderlings. He said that as party leader, he had paid a great deal of attentionto how the Labour party got its message out, portraying it as anecessary part of contemporary politics. And he said he had decided not to take on the power of the press. "I took a strategic decision to manage these people, not confrontthem. You would have been in a huge battle with no guarantee ofwinning," he said. Blair's testimony was briefly interrupted by a protester shouting:"This man is a war criminal!" The man identified himself to CNN as David Lawley-Wakelin, who madea documentary film called "The Alternative Iraq Inquiry." He accused Blair of taking money from the bank JP Morgan for theinvasion of Iraq, a charge Blair made a point of denying once theprotester was removed. It took three security officers to pull himout of the courtroom. The protester appeared directly behind Brian Leveson, prompting theshaken-looking judge to say there would be an immediate inquiryinto how the man got into a secure area. The protester appeared tobe wearing some kind of pass. The Leveson Inquiry was established after British public anger atMurdoch's News of the World about the hacking of voice messages ofa missing teenage girl who turned out to have been murdered. The case of Milly Dowler came on top of apologies from the tabloidfor the hacking of the phones of celebrities and politicians, andproved to be the last straw for the paper, which was shut down inJuly. Cameron set up the Leveson Inquiry to explore press ethics inBritain more widely, alongside a police investigation into phonehacking, e-mail hacking and police bribery by people working forMurdoch's British newspapers. More than 50 people have been arrested. Prosecutors this monthannounced charges against six people, including Rebekah Brooks , a former News of the World and Sun editor who later became chiefexecutive of News International, the British newspaper publishingarm of Murdoch's News Corp. She, her husband and four others are charged with interfering withthe police investigation. Blair's former director of communications said this month that the relationship between the press and thepolitical elite in Britain was too cozy. "I've been arguing for some years (that the relationship) gotitself into a very, very bad place, and I hope it can lead tochange," Alastair Campbell told CNNI's Christiane Amanpour. "It's not just about Rupert Murdoch," he said. "We have a lot ofnewspapers in a geographically fairly small country. ... And Ithink any political leader has to take account of the role theyplay in the political debate." Campbell, a former newspaper editor who became Blair's spokesmanwhen the Labour party was in opposition in the 1990s, said he hoped"some form of proper regulation" would arise from the hacking andbribery scandal. CNN Senior International Correspondent Dan Rivers contributed tothis report. We are high quality suppliers, our products such as S Type Turbine Manufacturer , Bulb Hydro Turbine Manufacturer for oversee buyer. To know more, please visits Kaplan Hydro Turbine.
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