Agencies/London

Buckingham Palace is weighing legal action over leaked film footage that shows Queen Elizabeth II as a child performing a Nazi salute with her family.
The 17-second black-and-white clip, which shows the future queen at the age of six or seven raising her right arm with her mother and uncle, who later became king Edward VIII, was released by the Sun tabloid late Friday.
The palace has launched an inquiry into how the tabloid obtained the film and will consider issues of copyright and criminality depending on the outcome of the investigation, a palace source told the Press Association.
The source was quoted as saying the royal household is trying to ascertain where the film came from, who it came from and why it was handed over to the newspaper. A palace spokesman said: “It is disappointing that film, shot eight decades ago and apparently from the Queen’s personal family archive, has been obtained and exploited in this manner.”
The video is believed to have been shot in 1933 or 1934 at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, shortly after Adolf Hitler and the Nazis came to power in Germany and well before the start of World War II, the Sun said.
Meanwhile a source said the Queen was apparently “livid” at the leak.
The source said that the Queen felt “betrayed” by “deliberate mischief making” and demanded to know how the film got into the hands of the Sun.
The Sun’s managing editor Stig Abell said the footage was obtained “in a legitimate fashion” and that its publication was “not a criticism of the Queen or the queen mum.” The Sun did not reveal how it obtained the footage but said the original film has been locked away and copies were made of it several years ago. “One has now been handed to The Sun by a source,” it said.
The palace on Sunday accused The Sun of exploiting the footage.
It shows Elizabeth playing with a dog as her sister, princess Margaret, then about three, begins to wave to the camera with both arms. Elizabeth also begins to wave with an outstretched right arm.  The queen mother stretches out her arm as well with her palm facing the camera. Elizabeth snaps up her arm again with her hand and arm in a straight line, without waving, in a gesture that mimics a Nazi salute. She begins jumping and dancing with her sister as her mother raises a straightened right arm as well.
She looks at her brother-in-law and smiles. The then-prince of Wales then turns to the queen mother and raises his right arm all the way above his head.
“This is a family playing and momentarily referencing a gesture many would have seen from contemporary news reels,” a palace source said yesterday. “No one at that time had any sense how it would evolve.”
The source added: “The Queen is around six years of age at the time and entirely innocent of attaching any meaning to these gestures. The Queen and her family’s service and dedication to the welfare of this nation during the war, and the 63 years the Queen has spent building relations between nations and peoples speaks for itself.”