BBC’s fake news about Ukrainian president

THE BBC is to pay ‘substantial’ damages to the president of Ukraine over false claims a bribe was made on his behalf to secure talks with Donald Trump.

Petro Poroshenko took legal action over reports Michael Cohen, the US President’s now-disgraced former personal lawyer, received a payment of around £300,000 to extend a White House meeting into more substantial talks.

The BBC made the claim last May in a headline story on the News At Ten and in an article on its website, a judge at the High Court heard yesterday.

Mr Justice Julian Knowles was told that the fact Mr Poroshenko – who has been in power since 2014 – was elected on an anti-corruption campaign made the damage to his reputation worse.

And because the ‘seriously defamatory’ report had appeared so prominently on the BBC’s flagship news programme,

it was picked up by others who also ran the false claims.

Mr Poroshenko’s lawyer Graham Atkins told the court the reports were ‘clearly likely to undermine the hard work undertaken by the president during his time in office, and to cause him very considerable political embarrassment ... across the global stage’.

He said Mr Poroshenko ‘deeply regrets it took the BBC so long to accept liability’ and to remove the article from its website, adding: ‘He believes that the resulting delay will inevitably have increased the damage caused to his reputation.’

The court heard Mr Poroshenko, 53, has accepted an apology and ‘a substantial sum by way of compensation’ from the BBC, which has agreed to pay his legal costs and publish a correction. The figure to be paid was not disclosed.

Jane Phillips, counsel for the BBC, said it was ‘happy to acknowledge that these claims ... are completely untrue’ and ‘to apologise to the claimant for any distress and embarrassment caused.’

‘Considerable embarrassment’