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Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch has become engaged to his girlfriend, his team has confirmed. The 92-year-old has reportedly been dating retired Russian molecular biologist Elena Zhukova, 67 for several months.
The marriage, which is expected to take place at his Moraga vineyard and estate in California this year, will be Mr Murdoch’s fifth, but sixth engagement. He stepped down as chairman of Fox and News Corp last year.
According to the New York Times, which broke the story, the nuptials are set for June and invitations have already been sent out.
Australian-born Mr Murdoch was rumoured to be dating Ms Zhukova soon after his engagement to ex-police chaplain Ann Lesley Smith was abruptly called off in April 2023.
The pair are said to have met at a party hosted by one of his ex-wives, Chinese-born entrepreneur Wendi Deng.
Mr Murdoch’s first marriage was to Australian flight attendant Patricia Booker.
The pair married in 1956 and welcomed a daughter, Prudence, two years later. They divorced in 1967.
Mr Murdoch’s longest marriage was to Scottish journalist Anna Mann, born Anna Torv, who he was married to from 1967 to 1999.
Ms Mann, from Glasgow, was working in Australia for a Murdoch-owned newspaper when she met the mogul. They had three children together; Elisabeth, born in 1968, Lachlan, born in 1971 and James, born in 1972.
Mr Murdoch married his third wife, Wendi Deng, in 1999 – less than three weeks after his previous divorce was finalised.
Ms Deng was working at a Murdoch-owned company in Hong Kong when they met at a party in 1997.
The China-born Deng went on to have an “enormous impact” on Mr Murdoch’s life,” according to his biographer, and gave her husband an image overhaul in the early noughties.
While she never held an official position at News Corp, she’s considered to have influenced its dealings in Asia.
During a July 2011 parliamentary hearing on phone hacking, she leapt into the spotlight when she jumped in front of her husband to protect him from a protester throwing a cream pie.
Ms Deng and Mr Murdoch had two daughters together – Grace, born in 2001, and Chloe, born in 2003 – before divorcing in 2013.
The media mogul married Jerry Hall in a church on London’s Fleet Street in 2016, just four months after they first met.
Mr Murdoch, then 84, tweeted that he felt “like the luckiest AND happiest man in the world” after the ceremony, but unfortunately it wasn’t to last.
The pair split six years after and it later emerged that Mr Murdoch allegedly ended the marriage via email.
Texas-born Ms Hall found fame as a model in the 1970s and was featured on numerous Vogue covers. She became a muse for artists including Lucian Freud and later moved into acting.
Ms Hall had a 22-year relationship with Mick Jagger, frontman of The Rolling Stones, which ended in 1999. They had four children together.
Mr Murdoch’s latest engagement is his second in as many years.
In March 2023, he announced his engagement to Ann Lesley Smith, a former police chaplain, and said: “I dreaded falling in love – but I knew this would be my last. It better be. I’m happy.”
The pair never made it up the aisle though as their split was reported just two weeks later.
Ms Zhukova, Mr Murdoch’s latest fiancée, was introduced to him by his third wife, Wendi Deng.
The biologist has been described as “very well-connected” by society magazine Tatler and her daughter, Dasha Zhukova, was married to Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich until 2017. She is now wed to billionaire Greek shipping heir Stavros Niarchos III.
Source:BBC
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