A powerful committee made up of members of Britain's Parliament issued a report Tuesday that it was misled by the News of the World, News International and a number of its executives over the phone-hacking scandal.

The Culture, Media and Sport select committee singled out former News of the World editor Colin Myler, ex-legal manager Tom Crone and Les Hinton, who worked for News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch for more than 50 years for criticism.

The report, in part, said: "Their instinct throughout, until it was too late, was to cover up rather than seek out wrongdoing and discipline the perpetrators."

It said it could now ask the House of Commons to decide whether there had been a contempt of Parliament and what the punishment should be.

"The behaviour of News International and certain witnesses in this affair demonstrated contempt for that system in the most blatant fashion."

Although Rupert Murdoch and his son James were not accused of misleading Parliament, the committee said it was "simply astonishing" that they only realised that the hacking was not confined to one "rogue reporter" in December 2010.

The report said they should "ultimately be prepared to take responsibility" for the "wilful blindness" of News International and News Corporation over the scandal.

Labour MP Tom Watson said: "In the opinion of the majority of the committee members Rupert Murdoch is not fit to run an international company like BSkyB."

However, several members of the committee made it clear that Watson's opinion was not unanimous.

News Corporation said in a statement that it was "carefully reviewing" the report.

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