Meghan Markle has issued a powerful statement after winning her appeal over a newspaper's publication of a letter she sent to her estranged father.
Addressing the court ruling, the Duchess of Sussex said: “This is a victory not just for me, but for anyone who has ever felt scared to stand up for what’s right."
She said she saw the privacy lawsuit as 'right versus wrong'.
Meghan explained: “While this win is precedent setting, what matters most is that we are now collectively brave enough to reshape a tabloid industry that conditions people to be cruel and profits from the lies and pain that they create."
“From day one, I have treated this lawsuit as an important measure of right versus wrong. The defendant has treated it as a game with no rules."
Meghan sued Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL), publisher of the Mail on Sunday, after the paper shared parts of a private letter she wrote to her estranged father in 2018.
ANL went on to appeal the original decision which ruled the publisher's actions as unlawful, but this was dismissed by judges on Thursday.
Meghan continued: “The longer they dragged it out, the more they could twist facts and manipulate the public (even during the appeal itself), making a straightforward case extraordinarily convoluted in order to generate more headlines and sell more newspapers – a model that rewards chaos above truth.
“In the nearly three years since this began, I have been patient in the face of deception, intimidation and calculated attacks."
Sir Geoffrey Vos, Master of Rolls, read out a summary of their decision following the three-day trial that occurred in November.
He said: "It was hard to see what evidence could have been adduced at trial that would have altered the situation.
"The judge had been in as good a position as any trial judge to look at the article in People magazine, the letter and the Mail on Sunday articles to decide if publication of the contents of the Letter was appropriate to rebut the allegations made against Mr Markle.
“The judge had correctly decided that, whilst it might have been proportionate to publish a very small part of the letter for that purpose, it was not necessary to publish half the contents of the letter as Associated Newspapers had done.”
Meghan's victory comes after the mum-of-two apologised to the court after she failed to remember giving authorisation to a senior aide to brief the authors of her biography.
The Sussex's former close advisor Jason Knauf released emails and texts between himself and the Royals as part of ANL's appeal, where it showed that he'd expressed concerns that Meghan's private letter could be leaked to the press.
In one email, Jason advised Meghan and Prince Harry: "Being able to say hand on heart that we did not facilitate access will be important."
Prince Harry replied: "I totally agree that we have to be able to say we didn’t have anything to do with it."
"Equally, you giving the right context and background to them would help get some truths out there," he added.
The explosive evidence also showed texts Meghan sent to Jason where she accused the Royals of "constantly berating" her husband.
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