Mills defends herself on website

Heather Mills has used her website to defend herself from what she sees as "character assassination" following her split from Sir Paul McCartney.

Reports last week suggested a judge in the couple's divorce proceedings had "thrown out" arguments from McCartney. A statement on her website rejected these and implied they could be upsetting in the future to the couple's daughter Beatrice.

"Heather is very saddened to be forced to respond... This is another prime example of an agenda to assassinate her character," read the website. It called a particular story "a complete fabrication of proceedings in court", and continued: "They have no consideration to what Beatrice will read in the future."

The piece, at heathermills.org, continued to quote from internet encyclopaedia Wikipedia: "Character assassination is an intentional attempt to influence the portrayal or reputation of a particular person, whether living or a historical personage, in such a way as to cause others to develop an extremely negative, unethical or unappealing perception of him or her."