08/07/2013

Saatchi Announces Divorce In Newspaper

Charles Saatchi has announced, via a statement issued to the Mail on Sunday, that he is to divorce Nigella Lawson.

It follows the publication of photographs that showed the former ad executive Saatchi holding TB chef Lawson by the neck while arguing outside a restaurant in London.

In the days proceeding the incident on June 16, Lawson moved out of their shared home and Saatchi accepted a police caution.

In a statement released to the Mail on Sunday, Saatchi announced he would divorce Lawson, suggesting that she had failed to defend him in public following the publication of the pictures.

His statement read: "I am sorry to announce that Nigella Lawson and I are getting divorced.

"This is heartbreaking for both of us as our love was very deep, but in the last year we have become estranged and drifted apart. I feel that I have clearly been a disappointment to Nigella during the last year or so, and I am disappointed that she was advised to make no public comment to explain that I abhor violence of any kind against women, and have never abused her physically in any way."

He went on to claim that the photographed incident, "could equally have been Nigella grasping my neck to hold my attention – as she has done in the past, although not in front of Scott's with a photographer snapping away".

Saatchi added: "I am sorry that we had a row. I am sorry that she was upset. I am even more sorry that this is the end of our marriage."

The Mail on Sunday claimed that Nigella was not aware pre-publication "of the divorce ultimatum being issued by her husband".

Lawson has not made any statement.

(MH/CD)

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