The mother of Diana, Princess of Wales, has
hit out at claims that her daughter's death was
anything but an accident.
Frances Shand Kydd, speaking for the first
time about the Paris tunnel crash that killed
her daughter, criticised "fantasy theorists" who
claim that Diana and her friend Dodi al-Fayed
were murdered.
She said she had found "no shred of evidence"
that there was a conspiracy against the
couple.
Her comments come a week after Harrods boss
Mohammed al-Fayed launched a legal battle in
America to gain access to secret CIA
documents he claims will prove Diana and his
son Dodi did not die by accident.
But Mrs Shand Kydd,
63, told the Sunday
Express: "I have
trawled the depths of
my imagination
alongside extensive
factual knowledge and
found no shred of
evidence to support
the stories.
"People who have
never met Diana were
suddenly able to state
authoritatively what she would or wouldn't
have wanted," she told the paper.
Shop windows filled with her dead daughter's
image made her turn her head away in "painful
disbelief", she said, and it seemed the wish to
make money from Diana was "boundless and
relentless".
"There were times when I felt as though I was
having repetitive major emotional surgery
without anaesthetic.
"I say this not out of anger, which I have
never felt, nor of pity, which I have never
wanted, but so I can illustrate how great and
calming was the goodness of so many other
people.
"They took the trouble to write to me in their
tens of thousands, sending comfort and
caring," she added.
Through a spokesman, Mohamed al-Fayed
said: "Mrs Shand Kydd is entitled to her
opinion.
"However, there are a lot of questions that
remain unanswered and a lot of things that do
not make sense about this whole tragedy.
"Let's not forget my son was also killed. I won't
rest until the truth is known, for his sake."
~*~
Charles urges professions to recruit
blacks(Electronic Telegraph)
By Jonathan Petre
THE Prince of Wales will this week urge the professions to recruit more black
people in a speech in memory of Stephen Lawrence, the murdered black
teenager who had hoped to become an architect.
In a significant intervention in the highly-charged race debate, the Prince will
say that more young people from ethnic backgrounds should be encouraged
to join professions such as architecture.
He is expected to take a lead by promising help to black people wanting to
become involved in the Prince's Foundation, created to co-ordinate his
interests in the arts, architecture, urban regeneration and building heritage.
The Prince's decision to deliver the first Stephen Lawrence memorial lecture
on Thursday is an indication of his concerns about racial tensions following the
murder of the teenager and the publication of the Macpherson report into the
handling of the investigation.
Mr Lawrence, 19, was studying for his A-levels when he was stabbed to
death in a racist attack at a bus stop in south-east London in April 1993. No
one has been convicted of his murder.
Prince Charles has been openly critical of the "grievous failings" of the police
who investigated the murder. In December he described the killing as "an
awful case" and spoke of the "urgent work" needed to prevent similar failings
by the police in future.
The Prince, who appointed his first black press secretary last month, has also
been critical in the past about the failure of the Armed Forces to recruit more
people from the ethnic minorities. In the Eighties, he embarrassed the Ministry
of Defence by demanding to know why he never saw a black face among the
Guards at Buckingham Palace.
He agreed to deliver the first memorial lecture, which will be given at his
foundation's headquarters in Shoreditch, east London, after an appeal from
Doreen Lawrence, Mr Lawrence's mother.
The teenager's death highlighted a lack of black architects, who represent only
about one per cent of the profession in this country. Before his death, he
gained work experience at the office of Arthur Timothy, who was born in
Ghana and is now the chairman of the Stephen Lawrence Trust.
Since his murder, the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Architectural
Association have launched scholarships and raised bursaries to fund black
students through the five expensive years of basic architectural education.
Prince Charles is expected to urge architects and other professionals to do
even more. He will also pay tribute to Mr Lawrence's parents who set up the
trust in 1998. The lecture will be introduced by Jon Snow, the Channel 4
journalist and newsreader and another member of the trust.