Exclusive: Princess Diana's Former Butler Reveals Why She Was "Misinterpreted and Misunderstood" in the Final Years of Her Life
“She could have sat back inside a palace, worn fabulous clothes and jewels and done nothing,” says Paul Burrell.
Princess Diana would have turned 65 on July 1, and ahead of the late royal’s birthday, her former butler, Paul Burrell, is reflecting on the final years of Diana’s life. The princess shifted her style and embraced her single life following her split from Prince Charles, but Burell says that Diana’s intentions were “misrepresented” in the ‘90s.
Burrell, speaking via the Motivational Speakers Agency, says that Princess Diana’s ambition was never to make headlines, but to use her platform to help the most vulnerable people in the world. He shares, “I find the princess in these times being misrepresented, misinterpreted and misunderstood because all she wanted to be was a humanitarian. She wanted to travel the world and shine her light on people who had been forgotten. That's all she wanted to do.”
While most of the public conversation surrounding Diana centered on her personal life and romantic relationships, the Royal Insider author says that those stories overshadowed the work that meant the most to his former boss.
Diana is pictured during a humanitarian trip to Bosnia-Herzegovina just three weeks before her 1997 death.
Diana walks through a minefield in Angola during a January 1997 trip on behalf of charity The Halo Trust.
“She could have sat back inside a palace, worn fabulous clothes and jewels and done nothing,” Burrell adds. “But she didn't. She used her profile to help other people.”
Diana dated heart surgeon Hasnat Khan between 1995 and July 1997, just a month before she died. Burrell calls Khan Diana's “true love,” adding that he helped the princess carry out the “love affair for two years without anybody knowing.”
“I'd smuggle him into Kensington Palace in the back of my car underneath a blanket,” he reveals. “This was my world and she trusted me with everything in it.” On the topic of Dodi Fayed, who was killed alongside Diana in a car crash, Burrell calls the late Harrods heir “a summertime romance.”
“Hasnut Khan was the love of her life,” he says. “Dodi was a distraction. She met with Dodi and that path led to disaster.”
