It's a Legendary Interview. Diana's Brother Wants a Probe

Charles Spencer alleges Martin Bashir interview only happened because of fake documents
By Kate Seamons,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 7, 2020 2:00 PM CST

"Well, there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded." As far as celebrity interviews go, it's hard to land a bigger line. That was what Princess Diana said to Martin Bashir of her estranged husband and Camilla Parker-Bowles in a legendary 1995 BBC1 Panorama interview. Now, Di's brother wants the BBC to investigate the origins of that interview. The Guardian reports Charles Spencer claims he only introduced Bashir to his sister after seeing faked bank statements that allegedly showed security services were paying two royal court advisers to give up information on Diana. The BBC has acknowledged the "mocked-up" bank statements existed but says its own records show Diana gave a handwritten statement stating she hadn’t seen the statements and that they had no role in her decision to talk to Bashir. The BBC says her statement has been lost.

The Times of London on Sunday reported that BBC director general Tim Davie had last week apologized to Spencer in a letter but declined to open a probe. Spencer is now demanding that very thing, writing in a letter to Davie that "if it were not for me seeing these statements, I would not have introduced Bashir to my sister. In turn, he would have remained just one of thousands of journalists hoping that he/she had a tiny chance of getting her to speak to them, with no realistic prospect of doing so." The BBC now says it "absolutely will investigate—robustly and fairly—substantive new information" but that its arms are tied right now because Bashir is "seriously unwell" due to COVID complications. "When he is well, we will of course hold an investigation into these new issues." (More Princess Diana stories.)

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