Maajid Nawaz's Chilling Reaction To Jeff Bezos Blackmail Claims

9 February 2019, 14:43 | Updated: 16 February 2019, 14:51

Maajid Nawaz reacts to news Amazon boss Jeff Bezos allegedly being blackmailed by a US tabloid with a strong go at the current state of modern politics.

An international scandal involving the world's richest man, a tabloid newspaper, and the US President has raised questions about extortion and blackmail after Amazon founder Jeff Bezos accused US publishers AMI of blackmailing him over intimate photos, claiming they had wanted him to stop investigating how they had obtained his private messages relating to his divorce from his wife.

In a blog post, Mr Bezos shared copies of emails between him and AMI lawyers that he believes shows the publication threatening to publish photos of him and his lover - but the company has argued it has acted "lawfully" in reporting the divorce.

Maajid Nawaz gave his reaction to the story in a damning monologue, where he described the state of modern politics as one of "blackmail, intrigue, corruption, politics, power, and murder."

"If it wasn't true you'd think I'd be completely making up one of those pacey thrillers full of every key ingredient that the tropes of fiction have overused in cliches," he started.

"It points to everything that is wrong today with US politics, generally perhaps with democracies around the world, but in particular with the democracy in the United States of America.

"Because it points to unbridled power, to special interests, to the conflation of media business and politics, to relationships that have gone from personal to professional, and of course to how power can corrupt."

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