It was Diana, Princess of Wales, who ended her two-year affair with a Pakistani heart surgeon shortly before she died, and not the other way round, her inquest was told yesterday.

In a written statement to the hearing Hasnat Khan, who had an intense relationship with the Princess, said that she had returned from her first holiday with the Fayed family a different person. After her second encounter with the family of the Harrods owner Dr Khan had met her in Battersea Park, southwest London, to learn that their union was at an end.

Previous witnesses had told the jury that it was Dr Khan who broke off the relationship because, as a surgeon, he could not stand the publicity and the disruption to his life and career.

Dr Khan, 48, who worked at the Harefield and Royal Brompton Hospitals in London when he met the Princess in 1995 through the wife of one of his patients, now lives in Pakistan. He has declined to give evidence in person or by video link, but his written statement will fuel Mohamed Al Fayed’s claim that the Princess and his son Dodi were in love and planning to become engaged.

When she came back from her first holiday with her sons as a guest of the Fayeds in the summer of 1997 she seemed distracted and kept looking at her mobile phone, Dr Khan said in his statement.

After her second holiday, soon afterwards, she told Dr Khan that their affair was over but denied that anyone else was involved. Dr Khan, however, suspected that she had met someone from the Fayed contingent. When he became aware of Dodi Fayed he told the Princess that she was dead, meaning that her reputation was dead after associating with a member of the Fayed camp. He said that the Princess had watched two heart operations on visits to the hospital: “She was very down-to-earth and made everyone feel at ease, but she was always flirtatious with everyone.”

Friendship had turned to relationship after the Princess, to Dr Khan’s surprise, accepted his invitation to join him on a trip to Stratford-upon-Avon to collect some books from his uncle.

“We had a normal sexual relationship and I have no reason to believe that she was ever unfaithful to me,” Dr Khan told the hearings.

He said that the couple had discussed marriage, but neither had proposed, although she had asked her butler, Paul Burrell, to sound out a priest to see if they could be married in secret.

“As far as I was concerned she would not have had to convert to the Muslim faith. The only problem would be if we had children and what faith to bring them up in. She never said she would convert, although she read up on Islam,” Dr Khan said.

He had suggested they move to Pakistan, where they would not be troubled by media attention. The Princess had gone to Pakistan to consult Jemima Khan, one of the country’s most prominent Western-born women, but had cooled to the idea. “She wanted a husband to be there for her, to have a normal relationship.”

The Princess was always greatly respectful of the Queen and although she did not like the Duke of Edinburgh she never expressed fear of him, Dr Khan said. Of her relationship with Mr Fayed, Dr Khan said: “I suppose it was possible that she was trying to make me jealous, but I do not think that was the whole reason. I think she would have thought very carefully before marrying Dodi; they had known each other only for a short time.”

Dr Khan dismissed the Fayed camp’s claim that the Princess was pregnant, saying that she was careful to take the Pill. He believed the deaths to be an accident.

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