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Final phase of Diana inquest begins

The Royal Courts of Justice in London, where the inquest into the death of Princess Diana is taking place, is pictured on Oct. 1 last year. PHOTO: AP

After six months of sensational testimony, the inquest into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, began its final phase on Monday, with the coroner using his summation to dismiss any conspiracy theories involving the royal family or secret service in her death and to rebuke their relentless, deep-pocketed accuser, Mohamed Al Fayed, the owner of Harrods department store.

The coroner, Lord Justice Scott Baker, said there was nothing to support allegations that the Duke of Edinburgh and husband of Queen Elizabeth II, "ordered Diana's execution," nor that Britain's secret intelligence service, MI6, or other government agency played any part in the 1997 car crash that killed her and her lover, Al Fayed's son Dodi Fayed.

"There is no evidence that the Duke of Edinburgh ordered Diana's execution, and there is no evidence that the secret intelligence service or any other government agency organized it," he said.

The five possible verdicts he outlined for the 11-member jury included unlawful killing through "the gross negligence" of the driver, Henri Paul, and "grossly negligent driving" by the paparazzi pursuing the couple.

But, he added: "It is not open to you to find that Diana and Dodi were unlawfully killed in a staged accident."

With British taxpayers' costs for the inquest having passed US$6 million, on top of at least twice that spent on inquiries of the crash by the British and French authorities, the coroner's summing-up appeared to bring the case full circle, back to facts that were known within weeks, or days, of the crash: that Diana and Dodi Fayed died when their Mercedes-Benz, driven at high speed by Paul, who was drunk and trying to outpace the paparazzi, crashed head-on into a concrete pillar in a tunnel under the Pont de l'Alma in Paris in the early hours of Aug. 31, 1997.

Starting last October, more than 10 years after the crash, more than 250 witnesses have marched before the inquest and into the headlines of Britain's newspapers. Testimony examined aspects of Diana's private life and her acrimonious and even fearful relationship with Prince Philip, the father of her ex-husband, Prince Charles.

Rarely have the sensibilities of the British public -- and their prurient interest in the royal family's private life -- been more provoked, or so richly sated by events in court.

In arresting testimony heard in February, Al Fayed called Philip a "Nazi" and a "racist," said his real name "ends with Frankenstein," and demanded that he be sent back to Germany, where the duke has family ties.

He said that Charles had "participated" in the plot so that he could marry Camilla Parker-Bowles, and that the two princes were motivated to save the royal family from having the princess marry a Muslim and bear his child.

The coroner's remarks were a fresh repudiation for Al Fayed, an Egyptian-born immigrant whose bridling resentments as an outsider in the cloistered world of Britain's upper class have made him a thorn in the establishment's side ever since his purchase of Harrods in 1985. His bitterness, based in part on the rejection of his application for British citizenship, formed the crucible for his insistence that Diana and his son were killed on Philip's orders.
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