Dodi's Dad Sues U.S. Government
The prevailing theory that the high speed car crash in a Paris tunnel that killed Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed three years ago was a terrible accident and nothing more continues to give no peace to Al-Fayed's father.
Tycoon Mohamed Al-Fayed, who owns London's Harrods luxury department store, filed a suit Thursday to gain access to secret documents he says may prove his son and Britain's Princess Diana were murdered in a car crash three years ago.
Speaking outside the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, a lawyer for Al-Fayed told reporters his client believed U.S. security agencies, like the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, had relevant documents.
"We know the NSA has documents regarding Princess Diana although they've indicated there's nothing pertaining to the tragedy itself," said lawyer Mark Zaid, who is representing Al-Fayed in the United States.
The Egyptian-born Al-Fayed has charged that "evil and racist forces" working through Britain's security service killed the couple and that the documents would finally reveal the truth -- that the royal family wanted to prevent his son Dodi from marrying Diana.
Court officials said the lawsuit was filed and assigned to U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.
The filing was made to coincide with the third anniversary of the death of Diana and Dodi in Paris.
Al-Fayed has unsuccessfully tried to subpoena the U.S. documents through another U.S. court case and will now sue for them under the Freedom of Information Act.
A French judge closed an investigation into the crash in September 1999, concluding the accident occurred because the couple's driver from the Ritz Hotel, Henri Paul, was drunk.
The White House said Wednesday that any suggestion the United States played a part "involving this terrible accident is totally unfounded."
Al-Fayed is not accusing the U.S. government of having caused the deaths of his son and Princess Diana, which he calls the "murder" of "two innocent people." But he does believe that the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency have documents which detail information from surveillance of Princess Diana and his son, documents he wants to see.
Al-Fayed's attorneys say they know of at least one instance in which the National Security Agency did spy on Princess Diana, listening in on a phone call she made to a friend, the wife of the Brazilian ambassador.
Al-Fayed charges that "the United States' intelligence gathering network...through the most sophisticated satellite systems, allowed the NSA to spy on Diana," passing on to British Intelligence information from monitored conversations.
"I believe they (U.S. intelligence agencies) are withholding some of the documents at the request of the British Secret Service," Al-Fayed continued.
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