(Credit: Closer, screenshot)

A French court granted Prince William and Kate Middleton’s request for an injunction against Closer magazine’s further publication of photos of Middleton topless, the BBC reported.

As we wrote, last week Closer magazine ran the photos of the royal couple sunbathing “on the terrace of a mansion” on a “private holiday,” and the pair quickly filed an invasion of privacy lawsuit.  Today the French court “banned a French magazine from re-publishing or distributing photographs in France of the Duchess of Cambridge sunbathing topless” and ordered it to “hand over the original photographs within 24 hours or face a daily fine of 10,000 euros (£8,000),” according to the BBC. The court decided that the photos are “by nature particularly intrusive.”

The BBC noted that the injunction against publishing only applies in France and to “pictures that have already been published.”  (Italian magazine Chi, owned by the same publishing company as Closer‘s French edition, published the photos this week.)

Separately, Michael O’Kane was suspended as the Irish Daily Star’s editor after running the photos, Sky News Newsdesk’s Twitter account reported.

As we’ve written, O’Kane defended running topless photos of Kate Middleton, claiming that the publication was “a service to our readers.”  The owner of one of the two companies that owns the Daily Star, Richard Desmond, said he was “very angry” by the Daily Star’s publishing the pictures and that he was “taking immediate steps to close down the joint venture.”

ITV News published a statement from the newspaper’s owner, Independent Star, that explains:

“Independent Star Limited has suspended editor Michael O’Kane with immediate effect, pending an investigation into the circumstances that led to the Irish Daily Star re-publishing pages from the French magazine ‘Closer‘, which contained images of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.  Independent Star Limited has no further comment pending conclusion of the joint investigation by the newspaper’s shareholders.”

Yesterday, Ireland’s press ombudsman John Horgan told iMediaEthics that his office hadn’t received any complaints “by, on behalf of, or with the permission of” Kate Middleton about the photos.

We’ve written to Closer for comment and will update with any response.

Hat Tip: Media Gazer