Princess Diana’s Ex-Boyfriend Reflects on the Moment When He Thought “Her Reputation Was Dead”
Heart surgeon Hasnat Khan said he warned the late royal about one move she made in the months before her tragic death.
When Princess Diana died in a 1997 car crash, she was with her then-boyfriend Dodi Fayed, who was also killed in the tragic accident. But less than two months before her death, Diana was dating another man, heart surgeon Hasnat Khan. Their under-the-radar relationship provided a dose of normalcy for the princess, and during an inquest into her death, Khan shared some rare insights into their time together.
In Edward White’s book Dianaworld: An Obsession, the author notes that Diana’s involvement with Khan “was more mundane, uneventful, and enriching than any that she ever had.” The couple met when she was visiting a friend’s husband in a London hospital, and for nearly two years, they carried on with their “discreet” relationship. But “Khan had no taste for the glare of global publicity in which Diana lived,” as White wrote.
According to the surgeon, the late princess broke up with him just over a month before her August 1997 death, as he wrote in a statement shared during the official death inquest. Diana had recently returned from a vacation with Dodi and his father, Mohamed Al-Fayed, and although Khan wasn’t aware of her connection to Dodi, he worried about her association with Al-Fayed's family.
Hasnat Khan, carrying medical equipment, is pictured outside a British hospital in early 1997.
"I remember saying to her at the time, 'You are dead,' meaning her reputation was dead,” Khan stated. “I said this because I was sure that it was someone from Mohamed Al Fayed's group and that was how I felt about anyone involved with him."
Even then, the Harrods owner—who was posthumously accused of sexually assaulting hundreds of women after a 2024 documentary aired—had a questionable reputation. However, Khan said that because of Dodi’s family wealth and connections, he felt that Princess Diana “finally realized that Al Fayed could give her all the things I could not.”
"He had money and could provide the necessary security,” Khan added in his statement. “You never see Al Fayed without six or seven bodyguards."
Princess Diana is pictured in January 1997.
Sadly, the security she had the night of her death failed her, as Princess Diana’s former bodyguard recently told Marie Claire.
Ken Wharfe, who resigned from his role protecting the princess in 1993, said he feels her lack of proper police security "ultimately led to the appalling accident in Paris in 1997."
“She was then relying on security which, in my view, was unprofessional and lacked the level of planning, coordination and communication that would have provided the best possible protection," he said. "Sadly, it simply wasn't there.”
