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MICHELLE Heaton has opened up about her surprise feud with a rival noughties pop star.

The Liberty X singer held back tears as she discussed the band’s battle with Hear’Say – the winners of ITV‘s Popstars.

Shortly after finishing as runner-ups on the 2001 reality series, Michelle and her bandmates Tony Lundon, Kevin Simm, Jessica Taylor and Kelli Young, were were formed into a new group.

However, despite being friends during filming, Michelle says: “There was a war from the get-go

“We were constantly pitted against each other in a world we were trying to navigate.”

It saw the breakdown of Michelle’s close friendship with Suzanne Shaw.

Opening up to Paul Brunson on his podcast We Need To Talk, Michelle said: “It was evident they wanted us to fail. Not just Hear’Say as a team, but the people around them.

“And so that would have then stirred up the pot with the Hear’Say members in order to add fuel to the fire when they did interviews about how they were bigger and better and we were not so… and that we were running on their coattails.

“It felt really harsh. We didn’t know how to navigate it. It felt like it wasn’t the five people that we met in the audition process.

“And alongside all of this, all I kind of wanted to do was reach out to Suzanne because that’s like one of the people that I got really close to.. and be like, ‘how is it? What’s it like?’

“I really wanted to share that with her. And at no point did I see what we were doing as hanging on their coattails.”

Thankfully, years on from the height of their fame, the pair reconnected.

Proving their bond back in 2016, Michelle wrote in her OK! Magazine column: “Massive congrats to my friend Suzanne who announced her pregnancy in what has to be the sweetest way possible.

“The video she made made me cry and her son Corey’s response was priceless. I loved the video and I love Suzanne. I’m so happy for her little family.”

1 of 2 | Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., speaks at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on February 24. He said Sunday that he was concerned about the depletion of the U.S. military’s weapons stockpile amid the war in Iran. File Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo

May 11 (UPI) — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said his department will “review” comments made by Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., about the U.S. military’s weapons stockpiles.

Hegseth’s renewed criticism into Kelly came in response to the senator’s appearance Sunday on CBS’ Face the Nation. Kelly, a retired Navy captain and former astronaut, said he received Pentagon briefings and it was “shocking … how deep we have gone into these magazines.”

“We’ve expended a lot of munitions. And that means the American people are less safe. Whether it’s a conflict in the western Pacific with China or somewhere else in the world, the munitions are depleted,” Kelly said.

In a post on X on Sunday evening, Hegseth questioned whether Kelly violated his oath by discussion the matter publicly.

“Now he’s blabbing on TV (falsely & dumbly) about a *CLASSIFIED* Pentagon briefing he received,” Hegseth said in his post, promising to have the Pentagon’s legal counsel review the comments.

Kelly said the information he shared wasn’t classified because Hegseth spoke on the topic during a hearing of the Senate Committee on Armed Services last week.

“We had this conversation in a public hearing a week ago and you said it would take ‘years’ to replenish some of these stockpiles. That’s not classified, it’s a quote from you.”

Kelly also shared a video of Hegseth’s comments from the hearing in his response on X.

The two leaders have been embroiled in a legal battle after Hegseth tried to censure and demote Kelly from his military rank over comments he made in November telling service members that they have the right and duty to ignore “unlawful orders” made by the Trump administration. Hegseth also sought to reduce Kelly’s retirement pay, calling his remarks “seditious.”

Release of Mahdieh Esfandiari comes a week after Iran released two French citizens held on espionage charges.

Iranian national Mahdieh Esfandiari has returned home after being held in France for more than a year as part of what appears to be an exchange of detainees between the countries.

Iran’s state television reported on Wednesday that the “rights activist”, sentenced to one year in prison after making online comments supportive of Palestine and the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that prompted the genocidal war on Gaza, had returned to Iran.

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The University of Lyon graduate, who had been living in France since 2018, where she worked as a translator, was arrested in February last year on charges of promoting “terrorism”, and released on bail in October.

“I think it’s clear for everyone that there is no freedom of speech, at least not in France where I was. The court’s ruling was very unjust,” Esfandiari told state television in a Wednesday broadcast.

Esfandiari’s release comes a week after French citizens Cecile Kohler, 41, and Jacques Paris, 72, arrived in France after being held for more than three years in Iran.

Kohler and Paris were arrested by Iranian authorities in May 2022 but were freed in November last year, after more than three years in prison on espionage charges that their families vehemently deny.

They were taken by French diplomats to France’s mission in Tehran, where they lived under house arrest until their full release on April 7. Upon their release, they were driven from Iran to neighbouring Azerbaijan before taking a flight to Paris.

President Emmanuel Macron’s office said their release was the outcome of a “long-term effort”, but talks accelerated in recent weeks due to pressure from the US-Israel war on Iran, giving a sense of urgency to the situation.

While an exchange was not explicitly acknowledged by France, Iran’s state-run agency IRNA had previously said Tehran reached an agreement with Paris for the release of the French citizens in exchange for Esfandiari.