French court says cannot ban Mosley video

Mosley had filed legal action in France, which has stricter privacy laws than Britain, to try and prevent the video from being shown on the Internet in France.

This would have forced the newspaper to pull the video from its site.

Though it said it could not block the website, the Paris court ruled that the photographs the News of the World had published in its paper version were a violation of French privacy laws and that the newspaper had to withdraw any copies available in France.

"The photographs concern an intimate matter, the sex life of consenting adults, which is not normally supposed to be revealed to others without the consent of the people involved," the court said.

The British Sunday tabloid published a front-page expose story last month with photographs it said showed Mosley engaged in lewd sexual conduct with prostitutes, which it claimed featured elements of Nazism.

The newspaper also published the video on its website showing Mosley with the prostitutes.

The video was temporarily removed before subsequently being restored after a UK court refused to issue an order blocking it.

Mosley denied any Nazi connotations and is claiming unlimited damages against the News of the World. He has resisted repeated calls to resign as head of the FIA, from automobile associations around the world, manufacturers and leading figures involved in Formula One.

This latest ruling makes little practical difference to Mosley as the edition of the News of the World that carried the photos sold millions of copies last month, mostly in Britain. The newspaper is not widely distributed in France.

On the question of the video, the judge said that only a British court was competent to ban the News of the World from posting material on its site.

Mosley had turned to the French legal system after a British court had refused to issue an order blocking it.