BRITAIN: The owner of the Daily Express newspaper, Mr Richard Desmond, was accused of a "grotesque outburst of slander and racism" yesterday after goose-stepping around a boardroom and branding all Germans "Nazis".
In a Basil Fawlty parody of Hitler's moustache, Mr Desmond also gave stiff-armed Nazi salutes and instructed Express executives to sing Deutschland uber alles in apparent mockery of a German group's bid for the ownership of the Daily Telegraph newspaper.
The incident took place on Thursday at a meeting of the finance committee of the board of West Ferry printers, a company jointly owned by the Telegraph Group and Express Newspapers - which are also 50 per cent owners with the Independent Group of the Irish Daily Star.
As reported in yesterday's Telegraph, Mr Desmond greeted the paper's chief executive, Mr Jeremy Deedes, and his three colleagues, with badly spoken greetings of "guten morgen". The Telegraph team took this to be a reference to a bid by German group Axel Springer to buy Hollinger International, the Telegraph's owner.
Mr Deedes reportedly responded with apparent good humour, congratulating Mr Desmond in turn on "seeing the light" following that morning's announcement that the Express was abandoning its support for the Labour Party in favour of the Conservatives at the next general election.
But the mood turned nasty after Mr Desmond criticised Conrad Black, the embattled former chairman of the Telegraph group, before asking the four members of the West Ferry board if they were looking forward to being run by "the Nazis".
Mr Deedes then observed that Alex Springer made the reconciliation of Germans and Jews a publishing principle and that the group's staff were required under contract to support the State of Israel. But to this Mr Desmond allegedly replied: "They're all Nazis."
Then, having been asked politely to sit down so that their meeting could proceed, the Express owner is said to have told Mr Deedes: "Don't you tell me to sit down, you miserable little piece of shit."
Mr Desmond's voice then rose further and there followed a stream of abuse, personal and general, peppered with four letter expletives. "We got abused pretty severely," Mr Deedes told BBC Radio 4's Today programme yesterday: "I don't think there was a swear word in the language that wasn't used."
According to the Telegraph account a moment of calm was established after Mr Deedes managed to make himself heard suggesting that their meeting was probably not going to be very productive. But according to witnesses it did not last long: "Mr Desmond renewed his attack with more references to the Nazis. He goose-stepped up and down the room, holding two fingers to his upper lip... and giving stiff armed Nazi salutes."
When Mr Deedes remonstrated with him he was asked if he wanted to "come outside and sort it out" and then, when he decided to abandon the meeting and the Telegraph team packed away their papers, "Mr Desmond ordered his Express executives to sing Deutschland uber alles".
The Telegraph was so offended it announced it would only reconvene the meeting if third parties representing other publishers who use the printing plant are present.
The Labour Party, meanwhile - which previously accepted a £100,000 donation from Mr Desmond (a former pornographer and publisher of magazines such as Asian Babes, sold recently in an apparent attempt for respectability) - was apparently delighted.
A government insider said: "Richard Desmond has just done the government more good in one day of supporting the Conservatives than he ever did when he was on our side." A spokesman for Mr Desmond responded to the story as it appeared on the Guardian website saying: "I have just read a very entertaining interpretation of what was a very productive 1½-hour meeting." But BBC business editor Jeff Randall quoted someone else from the Desmond camp saying: "I don't know what all the fuss is about, it sounds like your average meeting with Richard Desmond."