A Paris jeweller claimed today that Dodi Fayed told him just weeks before his death that he and Diana, Princess of Wales, were going to get engaged.

Giving evidence by video link to Diana’s inquest, Alberto Repossi said that Mr Fayed had told him of the engagement in August 1997 in a phone call about resizing a ring he had ordered. A few weeks later, Mr Fayed and Princess Diana were killed in a car crash in a Paris tunnel.

The jeweller said that after the phone call he had met Mr Fayed and the princess at a hotel in St Tropez to show them the ring. But he told the inquest that he could not remember what the hotel was called.

Mr Repossi, who has a jewellery shop opposite the Ritz Hotel in Paris, said he had not told Scotland Yard investigators about the meeting because he had promised Mr Fayed he would not speak about it. He also claimed that a journalist was “mean” to him.

A Perrier with the Princess

Peter Stothard, former Editor of The Times, recalls a discussion with Diana about memos, mistresses and the media

Multimedia

• Interview on the latest revealing Diana biography

BACKGROUND

• Prince comes home with 'the People's Princess'

• The explosion of vileness that followed her death

• Why I could not mourn Diana

Related Internet Links

• Diana - 10 years on

Related Links

• Duke’s aide to testify

• Henri Paul was not supposed to drive Diana

• Al Fayed suspected Diana crash plot from start

He told the inquest that American spies would know about the engagement as he claimed they had been listening in to Mr Fayed’s phone calls.

Previous witnesses at the inquest have expressed scepticism about Mr Repossi’s claims of an engagement. Last week Claude Roulet, an executive at the Paris Ritz at the time of the crash, told the inquest how he had assisted Mr Fayed in choosing a ring from Mr Repossi’s shop.

He said: “I know that a few days after the accident, Mr. Repossi started giving different accounts of the events and that his director of communications, Gilles Montrichard, advised him against making things up.

“This director had to leave his employment.

“As best as I can remember, it was a kind of romantic story that Dodi asked for an engagement ring,” Mr Roulet said. “[It] was not the truth.”

At the inquest today, Mr Repossi was challenged about different accounts he had given to police and journalists.

Mr Repossi responded: “You are very tough.”

He said he had received two phone calls from Franco Mora, the then manager of the Ritz. In the first phone call, Mr Mora had told him that a “very important client” would be visiting his store.

In the second phone call, Mr Repossi claimed Mr Mora had mentioned Princess Diana and Mr Fayed, given him a ring size and said the ring was needed by the beginning of September.

“But then the same day I received a call from Dodi who told me that he needed this ring for the end of August because at the beginning of September their engagement would be announced,” Mr Repossi said.

“I told him that I would do everything necessary.”

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Science News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Time-worn Freddie gives up Test matches
• Brighton company 'involved in cyber attack'
• The art of survival: it's all in the mind