Britons Snap Up Final News Of The World Edition

July 10, 2011

The Associated Press

A customer buys a copy of News of the World from a newspaper vendor in central London, Sunday. (AP)

Britons are snapping up the last edition of Britain's best-selling Sunday tabloid News of the World, after the 168-year-old muckraking paper was brought down in a phone-hacking scandal.

The 8,674th edition apologizes to readers for letting them down, saying "quite simply we lost our way" and acknowledging that "phones were hacked."

Allegations the paper's journalists paid police for information and hacked into the voicemails of young murder victims and the grieving families of dead soldiers prompted Rupert Murdoch's News International to shut down the paper.

The media baron is expected in London later Sunday, where he will face the growing crisis caused by the scandal.

The last edition included a 48-page souvenir pullout and quotes from George Orwell on the back page.

This program aired on July 10, 2011. The audio for this program is not available.