Former British home secretary Kenneth Clarke blocked an investigation into the interception of the telephone calls behind the "Squidgy-gate" and "Camilla-gate" affairs in case the press found out, a court heard today.

Britain’s ambassador in Paris at the time of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales emphatically denied today that he ordered the embalming of her body on the instructions of MI5 to “conceal the fact she was pregnant with Dodi Fayed’s child”.