South Sudanese run for cover as Sudan bombs border area

A soldier in South Sudan's SPLA army looks up at warplanes as he lies on the ground to take cover beside a road during an air strike by the Sudanese air force in Rubkona, near Bentiu, South Sudan, on April 23, 2012.

A woman runs along a road during an air strike by the Sudanese air force in Rubkona on April 23, 2012.

James Murdoch: Subordinates' 'assurances' on phone hacking 'proved to be wrong'

James Murdoch was back at the Leveson inquiry, where he claimed he didn't know about phone-hacking at News Corp's U.K. unit,  and didn't remember being told about it. ITV's Juliet Bremner reports.

By msnbc.com news services

LONDON - James Murdoch defended his record at the head of his father's scandal-tarred British newspaper unit before a U.K. inquiry Tuesday, saying that subordinates prevented him from making a clean sweep at the now-defunct News of the World tabloid. 

Speaking under oath at Lord Justice Brian Leveson's inquiry into media ethics, Murdoch repeated allegations that the tabloid's then-editor Colin Myler and the company's former in-house lawyer Tom Crone misled him about the scale of illegal behavior at the newspaper. 

Leveson asked Murdoch: "Can you think of a reason why Mr. Myler or Mr. Crone should keep this information from you? Was your relationship with them such that they may think: 'Well we needn't bother him with that' or 'We better keep it from it because he'll ask to cut out the cancer'?" 

"That must be it," Murdoch said. "I would say: 'Cut out the cancer,' and there was some desire to not do that." 

The 39-year-old Murdoch said that at the time he had no reason to doubt his subordinates when he took over at News International, which published the News of the World, saying he had repeatedly been told that nothing was amiss. 

"I was given assurances by them, which proved to be wrong," he said. 

Revelations that reporters at the News of the World had hacked into the phones of hundreds of high-profile people, including a teenage murder victim, pushed Murdoch's father Rupert to close the 168-year-old newspaper, triggered three U.K. police investigations, led to more than 100 lawsuits, and launched Leveson's inquiry into media practices. 

James Murdoch has found himself sucked into the center of scandal, with critics saying that he should have found out about the wrongdoing once he took over at News International in December 2007. 

Ben Stansall / AFP - Getty Images

A protestor wearing a mask depicting James Murdoch demonstrates outside London's High Court during his testimony.

The uproar over illegal behavior at the News of the World has already scuttled Murdoch's multi-billion dollar bid for full control of satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting Group PLC. He resigned from his post as chairman earlier this month "to avoid being a lightning rod," he said. 

Murdoch's relationship with politicians also came under scrutiny. 

The American-born News Corp. executive revealed that he'd told Conservative leader David Cameron that The Sun newspaper would endorse the Tories' election bid at a meeting at the George club in London on Sept. 10, 2009. 

The top-selling paper's endorsement was a blow to Britain's Labour Party — and critics claim that it helped secure Tory approval for the potentially lucrative BSkyB bid after they won the election in 2010. 

Murdoch denied the charge Tuesday. 

"I would never have made that kind of a crass calculation," Murdoch said. "It just wouldn't occur to me." 

Murdoch acknowledged talking to Cameron about it at a Christmas dinner in 2010 — after the Tory leader had been elected prime minister — but said it was "a tiny side conversation ahead of a dinner." 

Judge slams Murdoch's Sky News for illegal email hacking

"It wasn't really a discussion, if you will," Murdoch said. 

Cameron, who won power two years ago, has been forced to play down his contacts with the Murdochs and with Rebecca Brooks, a neighbor and frequent guest at his home in the countryside.

Rupert Murdoch, who is still chairman and chief executive of News International's parent company News Corp., is scheduled to appear before the inquiry on Wednesday. 

U.S.-based News Corp, owner of Fox Television and the Wall Street Journal, was thwarted in its ambition last year to buy the 61 percent of BSkyB, a major British pay-TV provider, that it did not already own. Amid the fire storm of scandal at the News of the World, it withdrew the bid.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:

• Runner who died in London Marathon inspires $500,000 donations
• France's election battle moves from hearts to heads
• UK cops close to arrest over British spy found dead in a bag?
• Judge slams Murdoch's Sky News for illegal email hacking
• Obama unveils sanctions on Syria, Iran for tech assault on activists

Son of sacked official fights back

Bo Guagua, left, with his father Bo Xilai in 2007.

By Bo Gu
NBC News

BEIJING – Bo Guagua, son of the now disgraced former Chinese Communist leader Bo Xilai, has come into the spotlight again in the wake of the political scandal rocking his family.

On Tuesday he issued a statement to the website of Harvard’s newspaper, The Harvard Crimson, denying allegations that his expensive tuitions at exclusive schools were provided by Xu Ming, one of the wealthiest businessman in China who has since disappeared.

"My tuition and living expenses at Harrow School, University of Oxford and Harvard University were funded exclusively by two sources – scholarships earned independently, and my mother’s generosity from the savings she earned from her years as a successful lawyer and writer," Bo said in the statement.

It’s not a rare thing in China for children of high ranking officials (called “princelings” here) to benefit from their powerful fathers by acquiring internal business information and monopolies in certain important sectors. Most of them have degrees from schools in Western countries and engage in highly profitable industries. But very few of them are as high profile as Bo Guagua, something he might be regretting in the past few weeks, when worldwide press tried everything possible to approach anyone who knows what’s happening to him and his family amongst China’s biggest political scandal in decades.

In the statement, Bo Guagua also disputed allegations that he had lived a luxury life while failing academically from Oxford to Harvard.

"My examination records have been solid throughout my schooling years. In the British public examination of GCSEs, which I completed at the age of 16, I achieved 11 ‘A Stars,’ …I also earned straight A’s for both AS level and A-level Examinations at the ages of 17 and 18, respectively," he said.  

A son with star power

Bo Guagua has always been a favorite son of the Chinese media and many young people in China, even long before the fall of his family.

People loved calling his first name, Guagua (which means "melon-melon" in Chinese) in a half-joking and half-despising way. People talked about him as if he was a Hollywood star, but also with anger and jealousy.

His father, Bo Xilai, was the handsome boss of China’s biggest municipal city, hero of cracking down gangs and a hot contender to be part of the next Politburo standing committee, the country’s top power echelon.

His mother, Gu Kailai, daughter of one of the country’s founding generals, a charming and successful lawyer, published a book about her winning a case representing a Chinese company in the U.S., which was later made into a TV series called "Winning a lawsuit in the U.S.” It featured some of the most renowned actors in China.

Born in 1987, Bo Guagua is polite, good looking, and somewhat mysterious. He attended schools most Chinese boys at his age would only dream of: Harrow, one of Britain’s most prestigious all-boys boarding schools, Oxford, and Harvard. He was interviewed by Lu Yu from Phoenix TV, in one of the most popular talk show programs in China. He gave a speech at Peking University, the country’s most prestigious university. He won a "Big Ben Award" by British Chinese Youth Federation at the age of 22. He dated Chen Xiaodan, the glamorous granddaughter of China’s former vice premier.

Stories of him driving a red Ferrari to pick up former U.S. ambassador Jon Huntsman’s daughter for a date spread like wildfire online. His pictures of partying at Oxford and Harvard were re-posted tens of thousands of times, one shows a red-faced smiling Guagua with his arms around two girls.

In response to the party pictures that were criticized as evidence of his lavish lifestyle abroad, he said in his statement: "During my time at Oxford, it is true that I participated in ‘Bops,’ a type of common Oxford social event, many of which are themed. These events are a regular feature of social life at Oxford and most students take part in these college-wide activities."

He said the idea that he was cruising around in a red Ferrari was absurd and a false accusation; his father also said the story was false in his last public appearance. "I have never driven a Ferrari. I have also not been to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing since 1998 (when I obtained a previous U.S. Visa), nor have I ever been to the U.S. Ambassador’s residence in China."

But missing in the statement was any mention of Neil Heywood, the British businessman who was murdered last November in Chongqing. Heywood was said to have been a close family friend who helped him get into Harrow. Bo’s mother is currently being investigated as a prime suspect in his murder.

Video reveals blind Chinese activist's plight

Fu’s group also prints and distributes Bibles in China.

For Fu, the escape of Chen was a major triumph, but it also has generated new concerns — for the wife and daughter of Chen, and for those who helped get Chen to safety.

In an opinion piece published in the Washington Post on Monday, Fu calls out the bravery of one such supporter, He "Pearl" Peirong, who drove Chen the 300 miles to Beijing after he escaped over a compound wall in Shandong.

"I am awed by the courage of those who helped Chen escape. Pearl told me she is willing to die with Chen because he is such a 'pure-hearted courageous person'," Fu wrote. "I was talking to her last week when she said 'guobao laile,'— that state security had arrived."

NBC sources: Blind activist is under US protection

Fu and Cai lived in a suburb of Philadelphia, where he started China Aid in his garage while attending Westminster Theological Seminary. They later moved to Midland, Texas, where they are raising their three children.

What prompted Fu to set up China Aid was a 2002 crackdown on a group of Christians in a house church in Hubei province that led to many arrests, among them five people who were sentenced to death, he said.

Fu and a group of contacts in the Christian, dissident and exile communities started publicizing the case and raising money, he said. Ultimately, Fu said, they used the funds to pay for 58 lawyers to defend the accused. They contacted the media, making the front page of The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Andrea Mitchell talks with Bob Fu, founder and president of China Aid, and Christopher Johnson, former China analyst with the CIA, about Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng's escape from house arrest under the Chinese government, and his current location in U.S. custody.

"That year, all the five death sentences were overturned," Fu said. "It was a major legal victory, and even the 'evil cult' charge was removed."

A group of activists who came of age as he did during the Tiananmen movement, are now human rights lawyers, many of them Christian, he said. Fu said he taps into this network, and links them to Washington by picking up the phone.

'Little ants'Fu compares himself and fellow human rights activists to "little ants" forcing "one case after another into courts, moving around and mobilizing and going through all the technical procedures" in place under China’s laws, but often not observed or even taken seriously by officials. 

"We want to move the pile of dirt with 1 million ants," he said.

"I had never envisioned or wanted to establish (a nonprofit) like this," he said, but now that China Aid is nearly 10 years old, Fu is gratified by some success. "We can help the persecuted, and we did advance rule of law," he said.

China Aid is doggedly following and publicizing many human rights cases around China, Fu said.

"You can write to imprisoned Christians to encourage them and to let them know that you are praying for them," through China Aid, the website says.

China censors 'Shawshank' as Clinton heads to Beijing amid dissident drama

Fu’s activism goes back to the Tiananmen protests of 1989, when he led a group of fellow students from Liaocheng University in Shandong province to join the massive rallies in the capital. After the crackdown on demonstrators he was one of many student activists required to attend special political study sessions and write self-criticism day after day. He worried that he would be forced to leave his hard-won position at the university.

U.S. relations with China are being put to the test over the fate of Chen Guangcheng, a blind Chinese dissident who escaped from house arrest in China and is believed to be in the U.S. embassy or another safe site. NBC's Ian Williams reports.

During this time, Fu said, he read a book given to him by American missionaries who were teaching English in China. It was the story of a famous Chinese intellectual who was addicted to opium in the early 1900s, but was able to shake the drug after he converted to Christianity.

"I was really, really struck by the story," Fu said, in an interview with msnbc.com. "I came to the realization if you want to change China, the first thing you need to do is change people’s hearts. And if you want to change other people’s hearts, you first you have to change yourself."

Fu and his wife, Heidi Cai, began holding underground worship services and Bible studies, he said. At the same time, he was teaching English at the Communist Party School in Beijing.

"I was God’s double-agent," he said, chuckling.

In 1996, they were arrested and held in jail for two months, and then placed under house arrest, Fu said. Then they received word that they soon would be jailed again, he said, in the “sweep” that preceded China’s Oct. 10 National Day.

By this time, Fu’s wife was pregnant with their first child, he said, but without the necessary permission from the government, which controls when a woman is allowed to have her one child. If she had been found out, she would be forced to have an abortion, Fu said.

So in the dark of night, Fu escaped through a second-story bathroom window and Cai left in disguise, he said. They fled to the countryside, Fu said, where they were protected by "house church brothers and sisters."

Fu said that with the shelter of this network, the help of a Christian policeman and travel documents obtained by a highly placed businessman, they were able to join a tour that went to Thailand and then Hong Kong, which was still under British control. Just three days before the territory was transferred to Chinese sovereignty, Fu and his wife were give refugee status, and flew to the United States.

Who is Fu? Chinese exile is 'God's double agent'

\
Taking a page from the "million hoodies" campaign in honor of shooting victim Trayvon Martin, China Aid created this show of support for Chen Guangcheng, who is blind, with hundreds of people donning sunglasses.

By Kari Huus, msnbc.com

Updated at 9:13 a.m. ET: After the dramatic nighttime escape of Chen Guangcheng from house arrest in his Chinese village, one of the first people to know that the blind lawyer was safe in Beijing was thousands of miles away — in Midland, Texas.

Pastor Bob Fu, 44, says he knew of Chen’s escape three days before the security guards surrounding the house discovered it. He says he was among the first to receive and post a15-minute video of Chen, made in hiding, appealing to Chinese President Wen Jiabao to bring to justice the local officials who illegally imprisoned him and his family for months. Fu says he also had a hand in preparing U.S. officials for Chen’s escape and arrival at the U.S. Embassy, while also helping lay the groundwork for alternatives, the details of which he says he cannot divulge.

Fu knows China’s security apparatus from personal experience. He made his own escape from China, arriving in the United States as a refugee with his wife and newborn son 16 years ago.

Now, through his Midland-based nonprofit China Aid, Fu is one of the leading voices on behalf of religious freedom in China, connected with activists in his home country and respected on Capitol Hill.

"Bob Fu is one of the most credible people you’ll ever find about what is going on in China," said Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., who chairs the Human Rights Subcommittee within the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Congressional-Executive Commission on China. "He’s very well connected and knows people inside of China who are the agents of reform — people like Chen who (take action) because they want a better China."

92 comments

<p>You know what... I have lived in China for more than 11 years not. My first child was unpermitted. THey wanted to forcefully bort our child. We wer blackmailed, and for 9 months of pregnancy I am not going to run throught the story of running across the country, trying to protect my gf from …

Show more