Prince Harry and Sir Elton John win right to proceed with court case against publishers of the Daily Mail

Prince Harry will appear in a lengthy court battle against a British publisher after a court rules his case can proceed.

Prince Harry and other high profile celebrities – including Sir Elton John and his husband David Furnish, actresses Sadie Frost and Liz Hurley – have been given permission to continue legal claims against the publisher of the Daily Mail, Associated Newspapers Limited.

In a judgement handed down in London on Friday, Mr Justice Nicklin, who had heard arguments over four days in March, ruled ANL had “not been able to deliver a ‘knockout blow’ to the claims of any of these claimants”.

It means the case involving Harry and six others against ANL can go to trial after the company failed to have the case dismissed on the basis the claims were beyond a statute of limitations and that some of the documents relied upon by the claimants had been confidential and were used in breach of a restriction order.

In his witness statement in March, Harry said he never thought anyone “would be so stupid as to hack my own phone”.

In his claim, which alleges unlawful information gathering in the period 2001 to 2013, he said: "Before this point, whenever I considered Associated (Newspapers Limited), I never thought about this. I did however think about all the other things I associated the Mail with, such as the harm caused to individuals and families up and down the country, and all the false stories they would pump out about Meghan’’. He warned the “whole country is doomed” if the company evaded justice.

Harry is currently involved in a handful of other litigations against other media outlets. In a separate court case against the Mirror group in June this year, Harry told the High Court he wanted to “to hold people to account for what they have done” saying press intrusion had “created a huge amount of paranoia in my relationships, I felt I couldn’t trust anybody”.

Harry, 39, and six others have accused ANL, which publishes the Mail and the Mail on Sunday, of unlawful information gathering including hiring private investigators to use listening devices, obtaining private records and accessing private phone conversations.

Last October the claimants said they discovered compelling and highly distressing evidence they had fallen victim to abhorrent criminal activity and gross breaches of privacy, accusing ANL of “habitually using unlawful information gathering as part of the modus operandi of preparing stories”.

In a 95-page-judgment, Mr Justice Nicklin said: “In my judgment, each claimant has a real prospect of demonstrating that Associated, or those for whom Associated is responsible, concealed from him/her the relevant facts upon which a worthwhile claim of unlawful information gathering could have been advanced.

“While it is common ground that the publication of any unlawful articles was not concealed, these were, on the claimants’ case, only the tip of the iceberg.

“What was deliberately hidden from the claimants – if they are correct in their allegations – were the underlying unlawful acts that are alleged to have been used to obtain information for subsequent publication.”

Associated Newspapers Limited strenuously denies the allegations. The company said the claims were “preposterous smears”.