Mills slams Piers over voicemail suggestions

Sir Paul McCartney's ex-wife Heather Mills has accused Piers Morgan of wrongly "insinuating" she played him a private voicemail message left on her phone by the Beatles legend.

In December, the journalist, currently hosting a nightly chat show on U.S. network CNN, told a hearing into press standards he had heard a recording in 2001 of a message left by McCartney on Mills' phone after the couple had had an argument.

Morgan refused to identify the source of the message but told the inquiry it was not "unethical" because of the circumstances in which he listened to it.

Mills was called to give evidence at the hearing in London on Thursday - and she took the opportunity to blast Morgan, alleging he implied she had played him the voicemail message.

The former model told the inquiry she had "never, ever" played Morgan a phone message or authorised him to listen to her voicemails, adding, "I can't quite believe that he would even try to insinuate (that). A man that's (sic) written nothing but awful things about me for years would absolutely relish in telling the court (sic) I had personally played a voice message to him."

The longrunning inquiry into press standards was sparked by the phone hacking scandal which led to the closure of the News of the World tabloid last year.