Britney Spears hits back at Diane Sawyer over infamous 2003 interview: 'I was in shock'

Britney Spears has spoken out about her infamous interview with news anchor Diane Sawyer, who brought her to tears in 2003.

Spears, who had just broken up with Justin Timberlake at the time the interview took place, wrote in a since-deleted Instagram post, "Do we dare forget the Diane Sawyer interview in my apartment almost 20 years ago?"

"What was with the 'You're in the wrong' approach? Geeze … and making me cry???"

The singer continued to explain that she "never spoke to anyone" at the time she lived in that New York City apartment.

Britney is free - and she's responded to a TV interview from 2003. Photo / AP

"My manager put that woman in my home and made me talk to her on national television," she claimed. "She asked if I had a shopping problem!!! When did I have a shopping problem?"

The interview resurfaced earlier this year when clips were featured in The New York Times Presents Framing Britney Spears documentary.

At one point Sawyer asked Spears, "Justin has gone on television and pretty much said you broke his heart. You did something that caused him so much pain, so much suffering. What did you do?"

The news anchor also suggested she was setting a bad example for children and "upsetting a lot of mothers in this country".

In other interviews throughout the 90s and 00s, Timberlake was portrayed in a positive light after the split from Spears.

"Something I never shared when I had that break-up years ago was that I couldn't talk afterwards," Spears admitted in her latest Instagram post.

"I was in shock … pretty lame of my dad [Jamie] and three men to show up at my door when I could hardly speak … two days later, they put Diane Sawyer in my living room … they forced me to talk!

"I was a baby … I was almost 22 and didn't understand, but I f***ng do now ... she can kiss my white a**.

It comes a month after the star was finally freed from her 13-year conservatorship. She's now been granted permission to sign her own paperwork and control her own finances.