UK government defends the BBC as critics circle and Trump threatens to sue

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s government rallied to the defense of the BBC on Tuesday after allegations of bias from its critics and the threat of a lawsuit from U.S. President Donald Trump over the way the broadcaster edited a speech he made after losing the 2020 presidential election

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said the national broadcaster faces “challenges, some of its own making,” but is “by far the most widely used and trusted source of news in the United Kingdom.”

With critics in media and politics demanding an overhaul of the BBC’s funding and governance, Nandy said that "the BBC as an institution is absolutely essential to this country.

“At a time when the lines are being dangerously blurred between facts and opinions, news and polemic, the BBC stands apart,” she said in the House of Commons.

A lawyer for Trump is demanding a retraction, apology and compensation from the broadcaster over the allegedly defamatory sequence in a documentary broadcast last year.

Fallout from the documentary has already claimed the BBC’s top executive, Tim Davie, and head of news Deborah Turness, who both resigned over what the broadcaster called an “error of judgment.”

The BBC has apologized for misleading editing of a speech Trump delivered on Jan. 6, 2021, before a crowd of his supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington.

Broadcast days before the November 2024 U.S. election, the documentary “Trump: A Second Chance?” spliced together three quotes from two sections of the speech, delivered almost an hour apart, into what appeared to be one quote in which Trump urged supporters to march with him and “fight like hell.” Among the parts cut out was a section where Trump said he wanted supporters to demonstrate peacefully.

BBC chair Samir Shah said the broadcaster accepted “that the way the speech was edited did give the impression of a direct call for violent action.”

The BBC has not yet formally responded to the demand from Florida-based Trump attorney Alejandro Brito that it “retract the false, defamatory, disparaging and inflammatory statements,” apologize and “appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused” by Friday, or face legal action for $1 billion in damages.

Nigel Huddleston, media spokesman for the opposition Conservative Party, said the BBC should “provide a fulsome apology to the U.S. president" to avoid legal action.

Legal experts say Trump is likely too late to sue the BBC in Britain, because a one-year deadline to file a defamation suit has expired. He could still bring a defamation claim in several U.S. states, and his lawyer cited Florida law in a letter to the BBC, but faces considerable legal hurdles.

The publicly funded BBC is a century-old national institution under growing pressure in an era of polarized politics and changing media viewing habits.

Funded through an annual license fee of 174.50 pounds ($230) paid by all households who watch live TV or any BBC content, the broadcaster is frequently a political football, with conservatives seeing a leftist slant in its news output and some liberals accusing it of having a conservative bias.

Governments of both left and right have long been accused of meddling with the broadcaster, which is overseen by a board that includes both BBC nominees and government appointees.

Some defenders of the BBC allege that board members appointed under previous Conservative governments have been undermining the corporation from within.

Pressure on the broadcaster has been growing since the right-leaning Daily Telegraph published parts of a dossier compiled by Michael Prescott, who had been hired to advise the BBC on standards and guidelines. As well as the Trump edit, Prescott criticized the BBC’s coverage of transgender issues and raised concerns of anti-Israel bias in the BBC’s Arabic service.

Near the BBC's London headquarters, some passersby said the scandal would further erode trust in a broadcaster already under pressure.

Amanda Carey, a semi-retired lawyer, said the editing of the Trump speech is “something that should never have happened."

“The last few scandals that they’ve had, trust in the BBC is very much waning and a number of people are saying they’re going to refuse to pay the license (fee)," she said.

A growing number of people argue that the license fee is unsustainable in a world where many households watch little or no traditional TV.

Nandy said the government will soon start the once-a-decade process of reviewing the BBC's governing charter, which expires at the end of 2027. She said the government would ensure the BBC is “sustainably funded (and) commands the public’s trust," but did not say whether the license fee might be scaled back or scrapped.

Davie, who announced his resignation as BBC director-general on Sunday, acknowledged that “we have made some mistakes that have cost us.”

But, he added: "We've got to to fight for our journalism.”

Associated Press journalist Kwiyeon Ha contributed to this story.

A view of BBC Broadcasting House in London, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

Journalists report outside BBC Broadcasting House in London, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

People walk outside BBC Broadcasting House in London, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

Outgoing BBC Director-General Tim Davie outside BBC Broadcasting House in London, Tuesday Nov. 11, 2025. (Lucy North/PA via AP)

Security guards outside BBC Broadcasting House in London, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran hit a tanker off the coast of Qatar and Kuwait International Airport early Wednesday as Tehran remained unrelenting in its attacks on its Gulf Arab neighbors, while acknowledging for the first time that Washington had been in direct contact about a possible ceasefire.

Israel sounded warnings of incoming fire from both Yemen and Iran, while launching its own attacks in Lebanon that killed at least five people.

An airstrike on Tehran appeared to have hit the former U.S. Embassy compound, which has been controlled by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard since the 1979 hostage crisis. Witnesses said buildings outside the massive compound had their windows blown out and that it appears the strike happened inside the walled facility.

With no sign of the war abating and more than 3,000 lives already lost, U.S. President Donald Trump suggested it could be over within two weeks even as he moved to bring thousands more troops to the region.

Trump has been under growing pressure to end the war as Iran’s grip on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and its attacks on regional energy infrastructure have sent gas prices skyrocketing to their highest level since 2022 and caused broad stock market fluctuations.

Iran throttled ship traffic through the strait, which leads from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean, after it was attacked by the U.S. and Israel on Feb. 28. In peacetime, a fifth of the world’s oil transits the strait and the spot price of Brent crude, the international standard, is up more than 40% since the start of the war, trading at more than $104 a barrel.

The U.S. has presented Iran with a 15-point plan aimed at bringing about a ceasefire, which includes a demand for the strait to be reopened. Iran’s own five-point response includes it retaining sovereignty over the waterway, and Trump on Tuesday suggested that the war could be brought to an end even with Iran still controlling the strait.

The U.S. “will not have anything to do with” what happens in the Strait of Hormuz, instead telling reporters that the responsibility for keeping the vital waterway open would belong with countries that rely on it.

“That’s not for us. That’ll be for France. That’ll be for whoever’s using the strait,” Trump said.

It was not clear why Trump brought up France, since Europe receives very little oil shipped through the strait, with most going to Asian countries. The president plans a prime-time address on Wednesday.

Trump, who has vacillated between insisting there is progress in diplomatic talks with Iran and threatening to widen the war, added that the U.S. is “finishing the job” in Iran and predicted it will be “maybe two weeks, maybe a couple of days longer to do the job.”

Trump has warned that if a ceasefire is not reached “shortly,” and if the strait is not reopened, the U.S. would broaden its offensive, including by attacking the Kharg Island oil export hub and possibly desalination plants.

Thousands of Marines and paratroopers have been ordered to the region in possible preparation for an assault in Kharg, though to reach the island by ship would mean transiting the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, which Iran has threatened to mine.

In an interview with pan-Arab broadcaster Al Jazeera, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi acknowledged receiving direct messages from U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff. He insisted, however, that there were no direct negotiations and said Iran has no faith that talks with the U.S. could yield any results, saying “the trust level is at zero.”

He warned against any attempt to launch a ground offensive, saying “we are waiting for them.”

“We know very well how to defend ourselves,” Araghchi said.

Early Wednesday a tanker off the coast of Qatar was hit with a projectile, the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said. The crew was reportedly unharmed. A fully-loaded Kuwaiti oil tanker came under attack off Dubai the day before, one of more than 20 ships attacked by Iran during the war.

Bahrain sounded two alerts for incoming missiles, and said an Iranian attack had caused a fire at a business facility.

In Kuwait, the state-run KUNA news agency said a drone had hit a fuel tank at Kuwait International Airport, sparking a “large fire” that crews were working to control.

Two drones were also intercepted in Saudi Arabia, which has come under repeated Iranian attack, and air raid sirens sounded in Israel though there were no immediate reports of damage or casualties.

In Iran, Israel said it had hit a plant producing fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid, to allegedly be used in a chemical weapons program. Iran acknowledged the strike on Tofigh Daru factory, but insisted it only supplied “hospital drugs” used for medical purposes.

The strike happened Tuesday, both the Israelis and the Iranians said.

Hospitals extensively use fentanyl to treat severe pain. But a small amount of the drug can be fatal.

Both Israel and the United States have alleged in recent years that Iran was experimenting with fentanyl in munitions.

In Beirut, at least five people were killed in an Israeli strike on a Beirut neighborhood. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said another 21 people were wounded.

Israel invaded southern Lebanon after the Iran-linked Hezbollah militant group began launching missiles into northern Israel days after the outbreak of the wider war. Many Lebanese fear another prolonged military occupation.

More than 1,200 people have been killed in Lebanon and more than 1 million displaced, according to authorities. Ten Israeli soldiers have also died there.

In Iran, authorities say more than 1,900 people have been killed, while 19 have been reported dead in Israel.

Since the Iran war began, 13 U.S. service members have been killed and 348 wounded, six seriously, according to U.S. Central Command.

More than two dozen people have died in Gulf states and the occupied West Bank.

Rising reported from Bangkok. AP writer Giovanna Dell’Orto in Miami, Florida contributed to this report.

Firefighters and rescue workers work at the site of Israeli airstrikes, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

A firefighter extinguishes a car at the site of Israeli airstrikes, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Israel's rescue teams and residents take shelter as sirens sounds next to a site struck by an Iranian missile in Bnei Brak, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)

A police vehicle is seen through a shattered windshield at the site of an Israeli strike in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Two men ride scooters past charred debris at the site of an Israeli strike in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)