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Blair had hoped to appoint Diana as ambassador: report

"The princess was intrigued by the idea. She liked the image of the country Blair wanted to project."

The Daily Mirror

The forthcoming diaries of Tony Blair's former press chief contain details about how the former British prime minister wanted princess Diana to be an ambassador for Britain, the Daily Mirror said yesterday.

Blair secretly met the princess before and after he became prime minister in 1997, the newspaper said, quoting a "well-placed source" who had seen parts of former political editor Alastair Campbell's book The Blair Years.

But the meetings were so sensitive they had to be held away from the heart of British political life, Westminster, because as a member of the publicly apolitical royal family Diana could have been accused of politicking, it said.

"Campbell's diaries tell how Blair and Diana always held their private meetings away from Westminster," the source was quoted as saying of the book, which is to be published on Monday.

"It's pretty clear they were discussing some kind of new role for her. He thought she could do a a brilliant job as a kind of ambassador for his vision of a modernized Britain," the source said.

"The princess was intrigued by the idea. She liked the image of the country Blair wanted to project and thought she could make a contribution. She was very excited about it," it said.

The source told the newspaper that Blair's wife, Cherie, sometimes attended the meetings, and on occasions Campbell was also there. The diaries say he was "completely bowled over" by her, he added.

The source said the diaries go into detail about the week following Diana's death, describing them as the "real-life account" of the film The Queen, which won Helen Mirren a best actress award at this year's Oscars.

The book also goes into detail about Blair's discussions with US President George W. Bush in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

It also discusses the former prime minister's role in the Good Friday peace deal in Northern Ireland.

Campbell's diaries, which he kept from mid-1994 when Blair became Labour Party leader to 2003 when he quit, are eagerly awaited as they are the first memoirs of a senior government figure since Blair stood down.

Extracts -- laced with swear words -- have already been aired, notably during an inquiry into the death of an eminent scientist following a BBC report which stated the government had exaggerated claims about Iraq's weapons capability.
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