The specific information in Johnston’s Paget evidence – 1.10 a.m. and Elysée Palace – indicates it has been taken from the occurrence log, entry 3 (see earlier).
This was the only specific information in that 1998 account, and it could have been aimed at deflecting attention away from Jay.
Philippe Massoni.
This log could show an early call from Massoni on it.
This indicates that Keith Moss did not follow normal procedure when he “disposed of” his original notes – see earlier.
Michael Jay, Witness Statement, 13 December 2005, reproduced in Diana Inquest: The Documents the Jury Never Saw, 2010, p630 (UK Edition)
This probably should be “his”.
The Jays’ visitors – Jay’s father-in-law and his partner.
Saturday, 30 August 1997.
From 11 Feb 08: 102.8
There is an issue with the way this was done. Burnett requested Jay to read the diary entry out, which seems appropriate – Jay was the author of the document. What happens though is that when a lengthy document like this is read through by the witness, it doesn’t give the lawyer the opportunity to ask questions during the reading – it would be rude for the lawyer to interrupt the witness. The upshot of this is the diary entry was read to the inquest without the scrutiny it deserved.
This also should be viewed in the light of earlier evidence showing the early Massoni-Jay phone call was covered up.
See section on Repatriation by Charles.
Michael Jay, Witness Statement, 13 December 2005, reproduced in Diana Inquest: The Documents the Jury Never Saw, 2010, p640 (UK Edition)
They were also not included in the Paget Report.
These reports and records were mentioned in Jay’s statement, which means that the jury – who had no access to his statement – were not even allowed to know that they existed.
The general evidence in Part 4 shows that Robert Fellowes wasn’t in Balmoral with the Queen. Robin Janvrin, Fellowes’ deputy, was shown to be on location there and dealt with issues as they arose.
The evidence in this section should be viewed in the light of the next chapter on The Royals.
Dated 21 February 2006 – see Paget excerpt below.
Sue Reid, Revealed: Diana Inquiry’s Tantalising New Questions, Daily Mail, June 17 2006
In an article in September 2007, just a week before the inquest commenced, Sue Reid wrote: “A tape recording of one unnamed informant claims that … Robert Fellowes … was in the French capital an hour before the crash and was seen in the telecommunications room of the British Embassy.” This was also never mentioned during the inquest. Source: Sue Reid, Diana: The Unseen Evidence Which Has Been Mysteriously Ignored Until Now, Daily Mail, 25 September 2007.
Earlier than the first Mail article.
The term used in Mohamed Al Fayed’s letter to Paget is “communications centre”. It may be significant that the identical term is used twice by Michael Jay during his inquest questioning – see above. The description in the Mail article is “communications room” which, although not identical, has a similar meaning.
When Paget quoted Mohamed’s February 2006 letter, they missed out: “At a meeting [our] officers were told of information which I believed to be authentic concerning Lord Fellowes.” Instead they just started with Mohamed saying “it is said”, while leaving readers to speculate about what that could mean.
The occurrence logs for 30 August 1997 have never been disclosed.
Mohamed had already answered “yes” to Burnett’s question: “Is that still your belief, that Lord Fellowes was in Paris that night?” Then after that, Burnett ignored Mohamed’s concern about the embassy documents, and asked the question again: “My question, Mr Al Fayed, was whether it was still your belief, and I think from the answer you have given, the answer is in fact yes, it is still your belief?”
Roberto Devorik said: “[Diana] told me three names that she feared – Nicholas Soames, Robert Fellowes, her brother-in-law, and Prince Philip. She said of Robert Fellowes ‘He hates me. He will do anything to get me out of the Royals. He cost me the friendship with my sister’.” See Part 2, section on Nicholas Soames in Chapter 7.
Even Burnett indicates he’s not completely sure – he says “I think”.
The Paget investigation was shown to lack credibility in the 2007 book Cover-Up of a Royal Murder: Hundreds of Errors in the Paget Report – a copy of which Scott Baker had several months before Fellowes was cross-examined.
The secrecy that has been shown here has similarities to a person who works for MI6 – in those cases Paget kept the statements to themselves and no supporting evidence has been supplied for their alibis (see earlier). Fellowes’ statement was withheld from the jury and has never been made available. There is a possibility that Fellowes – because of his unique position as Diana’s brother-in-law – may have been solicited to provide information to British intelligence.
This was Mansfield’s first question to Jay – and the above question from Burnett about Fellowes was Burnett’s last question to Jay. Mansfield followed straight after Burnett, so there was only a matter of seconds between Burnett’s question on Fellowes and this question on the communications operative from Mansfield.
17 Dec 07: 109.4
Philippe Massoni and Keith Moss both said they called Michael Jay. It has not been explained but those calls could have been on direct lines or mobiles. It is also evident that if the Chancery officer was away from the desk – Younes describes other duties he had to perform (see 17 Dec 07: 109.23) – then the call would be answered by the Residence officer.
Younes’ statement had been read out nearly two months earlier, on 17 December 2007.
See earlier – a part of the log detailing a telephone call was read out as part of the Younes statement.
Just after this, Mansfield asked about the missing log entries – covered earlier – and Jay at that stage admitted that there were records kept for phone calls.
Even Patrick Launay, who worked for the French funeral director, PFG, understood that there should have been an embassy log for phone calls: “You ask me if I remember speaking to anyone else from the British Consulate or Embassy that day. I do not recall, but I know that there is a duty system at the [British] embassy/consulate and there would possibly have been a duty log.”: Patrick Launay, Witness Statement, reproduced in The Documents book, p512.
In the Mail.
See section on Robert Fellowes in the chapter on Early Royal Control, in Part 4.
It may be significant that Scott Baker made no reference to this issue in his Summing Up for the jury.
Jay has failed to answer the question. The question was: “Did you cause inquiries to be made within the Embassy…?” Burnett is asking about the embassy staff – Was “anyone [in the embassy] … aware that Dodi Al Fayed and the Princess of Wales were in Paris on 30th August?” Even though Jay was the head of the embassy Burnett was inquiring about, Jay has instead given a lengthy answer regarding the awareness of “the French authorities” of Diana’s presence in Paris. This has led to Burnett reasking the question: “And neither was anyone in the Embassy?” I suggest that Jay’s apparent misunderstanding of Burnett’s original question could be an indication that he was nervous around this issue of awareness of Diana’s presence. The reason for Jay’s apparent nervousness should emerge in the Comment area of this section.
The following is an excerpt from Michael Jay’s statement regarding efforts by the British embassy to establish whether French authorities had knowledge of Diana’s presence in France. This is relevant to chapter 11 of Part 3, but was not available at the time Part 3 was written: “In response to French media speculation soon after the accident, I had asked Paul Johnston to make inquiries about the state of knowledge of the French authorities, and I refer to his minute dated 12/09/1997 to Mr Cowper-Coles (Head of Political Section at the Embassy): - ‘I spoke to Gouyette (Diplomatic Advisor) who rang back today, having checked with the relevant departments, to confirm that neither the Interior Ministry nor the Prefecture de Police had been aware of the Princess’ visit. The first they had known was when the accident was reported around 0300 [3 a.m.] the following morning. (Comment: this conflicts with the report earlier this week that Dodi Al Fayed had rung the police from le Bourget when they landed to ask for a police escort given the presence there of paparazzi).’…
“Chief Inspector Gargan’s minute to Mr Cowper-Coles of 15/09/1997: - “I spoke to Vianney Dyevres of the Brigade Criminelle this afternoon. He has spoken to the Chef d’Etat Major of the French Police VIP Protection Unit. They have assured him that the first they heard of the Princess of Wales’ visit was when they learned of the accident at the Pont d’Alma.”: Michael Jay, Witness Statement, reproduced in The Documents book, pp632-3. There is no evidence from anyone who was on the plane – Rene Delorm, Trevor Rees-Jones, Myriah Daniels, Debbie Gribble – to support the report cited that “Dodi Al Fayed had rung the police from le Bourget when they landed to ask for a police escort”.
Keith Moss, Witness Statement, 22 October 2004, reproduced in Diana Inquest: The Documents the Jury Never Saw, 2010, p648 (UK Edition)
Moss also said in his statement: “The French Head of the Brigade Criminelle and Protection … spoke to me. He said that, if he had been informed that the Princess of Wales had been in France, he would have insured that surveillance, however discrete, would have been applied and this incident would possibly not have happened. I told him that the Embassy had not been informed and did not know of her presence in France.” The issue of overall pre-crash embassy knowledge of Diana’s presence in France is addressed in the Comment. Source: Keith Moss, Witness Statement, reproduced in The Documents book, p656 (UK edition).
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, page 611
Inquest website: INQ0008320
This conflicts with the evidence of Charles Ritchie who says he became aware of Diana’s presence in Paris at around 11.55 p.m. on 30 August 1997.
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, page 611
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, page 610
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, page 610
See below.
See earlier Diplomatic Service lists.
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, page 607
The police indicate that they have been thorough in doing this – in the case of Steven Gunner, Paget says: “Wing Commander Gunner is posted abroad. Operation Paget officers have spoken to him, and [have received] correspondence”.: Paget Report, p611.
The Operation Paget Inquiry Report into the Allegation of Conspiracy to Murder Diana, Princess of Wales and Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, December 14 2006, pages 607 to 613
Paget did include excerpts from Johnston’s letters – see earlier – but when it came to his statement, only provided a description of Johnston’s evidence.
Rather than a Paget description of their evidence.
Jay and Moss’ statements were published in The Documents book; Donnelly and Younes’ statements were heard at the inquest.
There were more than four MI6 employees in the embassy that weekend, but the exact number is not known – see earlier MI6 chapter.
It is difficult to be precise about the degree of Paget’s failure to interview staff because a) Paget said it had taken statements from all MI6 staff but failed to declare the number; and b) we are not privy to the numbers of non-diplomatic staff at the embassy. Examples of non-diplomatic staff are George Younes and Nicholas Gargan. Younes was interviewed by Paget, but Gargan was not.
Philippe Dourneau: 3 Sep 97 Statement – see Part 1, p214.
The Roulet and Klein testimony doesn’t make specific reference to Diana’s presence in Paris, but they do recall the atmosphere of the time:
Bearing in mind that Paget failed to interview most of the embassy staff – see above.
The issues around the actions and knowledge of the French authorities have been dealt with in Part 3.
It’s possibly significant that when Jay did his Paget statement he addressed the issue of embassy knowledge of Diana’s presence, yet he made no mention of this diary entry. Jay actually said nothing at all in his statement about his diary, but he did list embassy reports and other evidence. There is a possibility that Jay’s 31 August 1997 diary could have been altered or updated well after the event. The evidence has been addressed in this section based on the presumption that has not occurred – in other words, it has been presumed that the diary entry Jay read out at the inquest was how it was written up on 31 August 1997. It is interesting that when Jay was asked by Burnett: “Do you keep a personal diary?” he answered: “I did when I was in Paris.” The implication then is that Jay didn’t necessarily keep a diary at other times. That leads to the question: Why did Jay keep a diary in Paris, but not at other times in his life?
In late-August 1996. Diana requested reduced protection in 1994 – see Part 2.
This excerpt was included in Jay statement – see earlier.
Diana’s security protection issues have been covered in the Surveillance chapter of Part 2.
Ritchie detailed the extent of the embassy’s role whenever an official visit – which this was not – took place: “We would not be informed of an unofficial visit; official visits, yes, because we often had to look after the Royal Air Force flight coming in, look after the crew and the bill would come to the defence section.”: 12 Feb 08: 143.14.
The full quote – shown earlier – includes a reference to the French: “None of us here knew the Princess was in Paris and nor did the French authorities.” This indicates that during the first 12 hours after Diana’s death Jay went to the trouble of finding out whether the French knew about Diana’s presence in Paris. It has been shown in Part 3 – Chapter 11 – that any claims of this nature by the French were lies. These volumes have revealed that there had to be a close coordination between the British and the French, to both, succeed with the assassinations, and then also the huge cover-up. Jay’s diary comment that the French didn’t know about Diana’s presence in their capital – and his continued enquiries in the following days to that effect, described in his statement (see earlier) – appear to be a part of the post-crash cover-up. Jay has effectively, in just a few words in his diary, provided a same day alibi for all French authorities – if they had no idea that Diana was in Paris, then they too could have had no part in orchestrating the crash. At the inquest Jay stated: “I received assurances from [my staff] that nobody among the French authorities was aware of her presence”. An “assurance” is “a statement … intended to give someone confidence” (Oxford). The question is: Why did Jay need confidence that the French weren’t aware of Diana’s presence in Paris? If the Alma crash was just an accident then it would not have mattered whether the French knew Diana was there, or didn’t know. This issue of knowledge only becomes significant if there is already evidence the crash was orchestrated.
I am not suggesting that the embassy didn’t know in advance – the evidence shows they would have – but “no notification” would be more believable than claiming no knowledge of Diana’s presence until after the crash had occurred.
This issue has been addressed in Part 4.
This has been shown in Chapter 1.
About 40 diplomatic staff and an unknown number of support and services staff.
This conclusion is based on other evidence – shown in this book and Part 3 – that indicates both British embassy staff and the French authorities were involved in the plot to assassinate Princess Diana. See below as well.