Princess Diana had 'middle-class' dreams

LONDON: Princess Diana dreamt of leading a middle-class life by marrying Muslim heart surgeon of Asian origin Hasnat Khan just months before she was killed in a car crash in Paris ten years back, her inquest heard.

One of the Princess of Wales' close confidantes, Lucia Flecha da Lima, told the 11-member jury at the inquest that Diana had expressed her desire to start a new life with Dr Khan in South Africa, the media reported on Wednesday.

"I saw why they were in love. She said she wanted to marry Hasnat but I told her, 'You're not a middle-class Princess and you can't dream of living a middle-class life'. She was dreaming and I don't think marriage was ever likely to happen," Lima testified via videolink from Brazil.

The wife of former Brazilian Ambassador to Britain, who had befriended the Princess in 1990, also said that she did not believe that Diana's relationship with Dodi Al-Fayed, who's also killed in the crash, was 'particularly serious'.

The inquest also heard that the chauffeur who drove Diana and Dodi's Mercedes into the crash in the Alma tunnel on August 31, 1997, had been driving very recklessly just hours before the tragedy.

Myriah Daniels, a holistic healer and masseuse who was on the staff of Dodi's yacht Jonikal, told the jury that she rode in a Range Rover driven by Henri Paul when the couple returned to Paris late in August 1997.

"Henri Paul almost killed us, honest to God. He was driving way too fast and recklessly, and I was saying 'Slow down, slow down,' but nobody's listening and nobody's doing anything."

"He was driving like a maniac through the traffic. He drove from the left-hand lane all the way across the freeway to the offside ramp and the Range Rover almost tipped over and I was sure we were all going to die," Daniels told the jury.

Though the police hold Paul responsible for the crash, Dodi's father Mohammed Al-Fayed insists that the couple were killed by the British secret service on the orders of Prince Philip as they were about to get married.