Fury over Princess Diana's lover's revelations

Coarse confessions by a lover of Britain's late Princess Diana and publication of intimate letters to him had her sons and supporters fuming yesterday.

Extracts from an upcoming documentary about former military officer James Hewitt, "Confessions of a Cad", showed him colourfully boasting about the affair, which began in the late 1980s as a series of scandals beset the royal family.

In the documentary, Mr Hewitt confirming his status as a hate figure for Britain's tabloid newspapers since he tried unsuccessfully to sell Diana's letters for millions of pounds.

Mr Hewitt says mockingly that heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles, whose marriage to Diana collapsed as both were unfaithful, may even thank him for occupying her while he was with his own lover Camilla Parker Bowles.

"Charles was probably grateful someone was looking after his wife," he said.

A mixture of extracts has been published this week by British tabloid newspapers and TV station Channel Four, which will air the documentary next Thursday.

In the programme, a friend of Mr Hewitt reads some of Diana's letters to him during the affair.

"Boy oh boy, does the earth shake when I get a letter from my desert friend, screams of delight, tears, you name it. Demented female on the loose, that's for sure," she wrote in one letter while Hewitt was serving in the 1991 Gulf War.