In 2008, it launched the China African News Service while in April last year it teamed up with telecommunications firm Safaricom to start a mobile newspaper in Kenya.

CNN: Chinese media make inroads into Africa

In the same year, the group also carried out attacks on schools, the offices of the highly respected ThisDay newspaper and mobile phone firms, which it accused of colluding with the security forces by handing over data to them - an allegation the companies denied.

BBC: Boko Haram timeline: From preachers to slave raiders

The Sun's lawyer said the newspaper accepted that her mobile phone "should not have been accessed" and added: "There has been a serious misuse of her private information".

BBC: Sun apologises for accessing MP's stolen phone

The new allegations follow the release by the Guardian newspaper last week of mobile phone footage that appeared to show a police officer directing racist remarks at a young black man arrested after the riots in London last summer.

CNN: London's Metropolitan Police faces racism claims

This from the likes of a bakery operation in Spain, a Dutch newspaper group, a Rumanian mobile phone company and in the U.S., the fashion clothing companies of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger.

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Mr Snook will become executive chairman when Orange is floated together with other mobile assets of France Telecom later this year, according to UK newspaper reports.

BBC: 'Job switch' for Orange chief

Rumours went around earlier this week that the fruity firm was getting a cheap mobile ready for market, but marketing chief Phil Schiller told a Chinese newspaper that Apple was doing no such thing.

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Chinese mobile device maker HTC has been chosen to manufacture two new Facebook -branded smartphones, according to London financial newspaper City A.M.

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