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(Adds quotes, Morgan's former co-presenter, ITV share price)
By Estelle Shirbon
LONDON, March 10 (Reuters) - Piers Morgan, the pugnacious
British TV presenter who lost his job over his attacks on
Prince Harry's wife Meghan, said on Wednesday he still did not
believe what she had said during her Oprah Winfrey interview.
Morgan, 55, left ITV's Good Morning Britain on Tuesday after
a backlash against his comments on Meghan's interview with
Winfrey, in which she revealed she had felt suicidal while
living as a royal in Britain.
"On Monday, I said I didn't believe Meghan Markle in her
Oprah interview. I've had time to reflect on this opinion, and I
still don't. If you did, OK," Morgan said in a
characteristically combative Tweet on Wednesday morning.
"Freedom of speech is a hill I'm happy to die on. Thanks for
all the love, and hate. I'm off to spend more time with my
opinions," he told his 7.8 million Twitter followers.
He added a photo of Winston Churchill with a quote on free
speech.
In an interview that has embarrassed Britain's
tradition-bound monarchy, Meghan, who married Prince Harry in
2018, said the royal family had rejected her pleas for mental
health support.
The American actress, who is mixed race, also said that
someone in the royal household had raised questions about the
colour of her unborn son's skin.
The morning after the interview was aired on U.S.
television, Morgan said on Good Morning Britain, among a torrent
of other criticisms, that he did not believe a word Meghan had
said. In a Tweet, he called her "Princess Pinocchio".
The following morning, he stormed off the set of the live
programme when challenged by a co-presenter about his stance.
Later that day, ITV said he was leaving.
Monday's programme attracted more than 41,000 complaints to
Britain's media regulator, the second highest in its history,
which announced an investigation.
Morgan first made his name in the cut-throat world of the
British tabloid press, culminating in stints editing the
now-defunct News of the World, then the Daily Mirror.
He later went into television, appearing as a judge on the
reality shows America's Got Talent and Britain's Got Talent. For
three years he hosted a chat show on CNN.
Morgan's detractors said his attitude towards Meghan seemed
to be partly driven by personal animus because, by his own
account, he had got on "brilliantly" with her when he had first
met her but she had later dropped contact with him.
Susanna Reid, who co-presented Good Morning Britain with
Morgan and frequently disagreed with him on air, described him
on Wednesday's programme as "outspoken, challenging,
opinionated, disruptive".
Morgan told reporters on Tuesday he thought Meghan's
interview had damaged the monarchy and Queen Elizabeth at a time
when her 99-year-old husband Prince Philip was in hospital,
which he said was "contemptible".
"If I have to fall on my sword for expressing an honestly
held opinion about Meghan Markle and that diatribe of bilge that
she came out with in that interview, so be it," he said.
(Additional reporting by Gerry Mey; Editing by Mike
Collett-White and Angus MacSwan)
