Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed died 'after three last-minute choices'
After years of being "haunted" by conspiracy theories about Princess Diana's death in 1997, Mohamed Al Fayed finally admitted there was no way anyone could have planned an attack on the Princess of Wales and his son, Dodi Al Fayed, as every decision made before their tragic passing was "last minute".
The former Harrods boss and owner of Fulham FC from 1997 until 2013 had been one of the most prominent figures to fuel conspiracy theories about the car crash that killed Diana and Dodi, but following Mohamed's death in August, journalist Andrew Neil has claimed he once told him that "nobody knew in advance" that the pair would be travelling through Paris by car that night.
Princess Diana and Dodi had been staying in the Imperial Suite at The Ritz hotel in Paris, but on their last night in the city, Dodi had decided to take Diana to his private flat near the Champs-Elysées in order to escape the paparazzi that had been swarming the hotel.
After making his split-second decision to not stay at the hotel, Dodi then had to ask his dad for permission to use his personal security detail to help him and Diana escape the paparazzi via the back entrance of The Ritz. Mohamed initially denied his request but eventually caved, leading to the second last-minute choice made that night.
Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed both died in the crash (Patrick Bar/AP/REX/Shutterstock)
Mohamed Al Fayed said all the decisions made before the crash were 'last minute' (Getty Images)Then, when the pair were finally on the road to Dodi's flat, another last-minute decision was made to take a different route than originally planned. The new route led them through a tunnel where the fatal crash happened, but as it wasn't planned ahead of time, Mohamed believed it was unlikely anybody was "lying in wait" for the couple.
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Writing in the Daily Mail, Andrew recalled: "Of course, Dodi was, sadly, the architect of his own death and of Diana's. The decision to leave The Ritz wasn't taken until the very last minute, as was the roundabout route through a tunnel to get to Dodi's apartment. By Al Fayed's own testimony to me, nobody could have been lying in wait to assassinate them since nobody knew in advance what they were going to do or how they were going to do it."
Dodi's father Mohamed passed away earlier this year at the age of 94, and had been said to be "haunted" by conspiracy theories surrounding the death of his son and Princess Diana for 26 years. In the 2008 inquest into Princess Diana's death, Mohamed claimed that Diana was killed because she was pregnant with Dodi's baby at the time of her death, and that the couple had been planning to announce their engagement. He said in court: "I am the only person they told."
However a post mortem found that Diana was not pregnant and her friends also claimed that it wasn't possible. Mohamed accused an array of people and organisations of being implicated in the alleged conspiracy, including former Prime Minister Tony Blair, Diana's sister Sarah McCorquodale and her husband Robert Fellowes, French toxicologists, French ambulance drivers, the car's driver Henri Paul, two former London police chiefs, three bodyguards, and even some of Diana's closest friends.
The inquest found that Diana and Dodi were unlawfully killed in the crash but no plot was uncovered. His relationship with the Royal Family remained soured for years, but softened slightly after Prince William extended an olive branch to him and invited his daughters to a memorial for Diana. In more recent years, he reportedly came to believe his son and Diana's death was an accident.
Ex-PR executive Chester Stern - who represented the billionaire from 2001 to 2004 and remained a close friend of his - said: "He backed off it being a direct conspiracy led by Prince Philip in more recent years. This suggests he was quietly beginning to accept it was an accident."
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