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Di's brother-in-law denies plot
12/02/2008 19:04 - (SA)
London - Princess Diana's brother-in-law denied on Tuesday that he was in Paris directing a plot to kill her in 1997.
Robert Fellowes, who is married to Diana's sister Jane and was formerly private secretary to Queen Elizabeth II, testified at a coroner's inquest that he was in Norfolk in eastern England on the August night that Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Fayed were in a fatal car crash in Paris.
Fayed's father, Mohamed al-Fayed, has claimed that Fellowes - now Lord Fellowes - had commandeered a communications post at the British Embassy in Paris on the night to send messages to an intelligence agency as part of a murder plot.
Fellowes also testified that the queen, like Diana, was concerned about the possibility of bugging, and that public rooms at Buckingham Palace were regularly swept for eavesdropping devices.
He also revealed that the palace, after consulting the government, decided not to initiate an investigation of the interception of embarrassing telephone calls involving Diana and her former husband, Prince Charles.
Michael Jay, who was Britain's ambassador in Paris in 1997, testified on Monday that Fellowes was not at the embassy on the night of August 30-31, when the crash occurred.
'We weren't in Paris'
Ian Burnett, a lawyer employed by the coroner, Lord Justice Scott Baker, reminded the inquest that al-Fayed had alleged that Fellowes had been at the embassy from 23:00, shortly before the crash, and had commandeered a message centre.
Asked whether he was in Paris on the night, Fellowes said: "We were in Norfolk that evening, we had people to stay, we went to an entertainment show by Mr. John Mortimer in Burnham Market church."
Fellowes said there was concern at the palace in 1993 following the leak of two telephone conversations: one between Diana and her friend James Gilbey, who called her "Squidgy," and another intimate chat between Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, who became his second wife.
Al-Fayed's lawyers have alleged that Diana's conversation was intercepted by GCHQ, the electronic monitoring arm of British intelligence.
Fellowes said the government advised against a formal investigation, fearing that if it became known it would be seen as confirmation of some involvement by government agents in the interception.
The inquest has heard testimony about Diana's fears of surveillance, and that she had ordered sweeps of her rooms at Kensington Palace that turned up no firm evidence of bugging.
Checking for bugging
Fellowes said the queen had similar concerns, and the office where he met the queen was regularly checked.
"I wouldn't say it was a constant preoccupation but yes we needed reassurance at regular intervals that there was no bugging going on," Fellowes said.
The coroner disclosed on Monday that the cost of the inquest has reached £2.2m.
Nearly £1.1m, was spent on the team of lawyers assisting Baker. The next largest expenditure, some £370 000, was for the jury's visit to Paris and the cost of video conferencing for witnesses testifying from Paris and from other countries.
The figures, disclosed on Monday, cover the period through January 31 and do not include the amount spent by Mohamed a- Fayed and his Ritz Hotel for their own teams of lawyers; nor does it include the cost of the British police investigation, which reportedly cost £3.6m.
- AP
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