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Julie Burchill, the incendiary Telegraph columnist, has sparked a fresh wave of controversy for tweeting about Prince Harry and Meghan’s newborn baby girl.
The couple announced their baby girl, who arrived on Friday, will be called Lilibet Diana – after Her Majesty The Queen’s family nickname and her late grandmother, The Princess of Wales.
But Burchill – who was recently forced to make a public apology for racist messages about journalist Ash Sarkar – tweeted yesterday: “What a missed opportunity. They could have called it Georgina Floydina!”
The comment references George Floyd, just over a year after he was murdered by police officer Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis.
Burchill was heavily criticsed for the reference, and for calling the baby ‘it’.
She replied to the criticism, saying: “I called the baby IT as a nod to non-binary bollocks – and if you think you can make me respect a violent criminal who once held a gun to a pregnant woman’s stomach, you’re in for a VERY long wait.
“Have a good time with your pearl-clutching life-wasting woo-woo, ya clowns!”
Burchill also posted that the first words of the baby will be ‘Free Palestine!’
British media personality Adil Ray brought up a previous scandal in which Burchill was involved, saying she “still works for the Telegraph”.
And Twitter user Alexander Williams said “the fact that this person has a career in British media says a lot of terrible things about our society”.
Nadine White, race correspondent at The Independent, said Burchill’s tweets represent “disgusting racism”.
It was only three months ago that Burchill was forced to make a public apology to leftwing journalist and activist Ash Sarkar and agreed to pay her substantial damages.
The move came after Burchill made a series of tweets last year, accusing Sarkar of being an “Islamist” who “worships a paedophile”.
In her apology, the Telegraph writer said she “sincerely regretted” the defamatory statements, that she “retracted” them and had undertaken “not to repeat”.
The columnist was due to have her book, Welcome to the Woke Trials: How #Identity Killed Progressive Politics, published by Hatchette imprint Little, Brown, but the publisher decided to cancel it.
However, Edinburgh-based publisher Stirling Publishing acquired the rights, and the book is now set to be published later this year.
Related: Harry and Meghan welcome baby daughter: Lilibet ‘Lili’ Diana
Julie Burchill pays Ash Sarkar ‘substantial damages’ – and says sorry – after libel case
