Four UK journalists held over phone hacking

Four current and former journalists for Britain’s Mirror Group Newspapers have been arrested on suspicion of phone hacking, London’s Metropolitan Police says.

Police said it had made the arrests on suspected conspiracy to intercept voicemails at Mirror Group Newspapers between 2003 to 2004, focused mainly on The Sunday Mirror.

British Mirror Group Newspapers publishes the Sunday Mirror, the Daily Mirror and The People, as well as Scotland’s Daily Record and Sunday Mail.

Former editor of the Sunday Mirror Tina Weaver, ex-editor of the People Mark Thomas, editor of the People James Scott and the People deputy editor Nick Buckley were among those held on Thursday by detectives from Scotland Yard’s Operation Weeting inquiry into alleged phone hacking.

Police said the new phone hacking conspiracy was separate from those that brought down the 168-year-old British newspaper The News of the World .

The scale of the long-running phone hacking scandal is bigger than initially reported and it has led to dozens of arrests and the resignation of several senior police officers.

The scandal involved allegations of illegal snooping on celebrities, crime victims, politicians and others.