Princess’s sister loses privacy bid

Telma Ortiz (pictured), the sister of Crown Princess Letizia of Spain, appeared before a Spanish court on Thursday seeking to restrain "all media outlets" from filming or photographing her. She argues she is not a public figure and so is entitled to some privacy. However, the view of the presiding judge, Maria Lourdes Perez Padilla, was that, whether she liked it or not, she was sufficiently famous and enough of a public figure to warrant such intrusions.

In court, Ortiz, 35, said the media had been harassing her and her companion, Enrique Martin Llop, since they returned from the Philippines, where she had been employed as an aid worker. To put an end to it, Ortiz sought a blanket ban on news organisations publishing photos or footage of her, except on the very rare occasions she appears at official functions in her role as sister of the crown princess.

Judge Padilla was having none of it, though, saying that any restraining order would be "legally unviable" given that Ortiz and Llop are in the limelight anyway.

Perhaps they should move to Britain where the days of the paparazzi appear numbered after publicity queen Liz Hurley, her husband Arun Nayar and her former boyfriend Hugh Grant successfully sued on Thursday for invasion of their privacy during a holiday together in the Maldives. They were awarded £58,000 in damages, to be paid by two picture agencies – Big Pictures and Eliot Press - with contributions from the two newspapers that ran the snaps.

The High Court settlement follows a recent Court of Appeal ruling against Big Pictures over photographs taken of JK Rowling's son in the street when the boy was a toddler. The appeal judges ruled that the children of celebrities had a right to privacy when going about their "normal activities" in public.