Love-struck Diana was willing to move to Pakistan: Jemima Khan

August 3, 2013

diana

London, Aug 3: Princess Diana was so "madly in love" with Pakistani surgeon Hasnat Khan that she wanted to marry him and was even willing to move to Pakistan, according to Jemima Khan.

Jemima, the former wife of Pakistani cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan and a friend of the late princess, has written a detailed account of their friendship in an article for the September issue of 'Vanity Fair' titled 'The Grandmother Prince George Never Knew'.

"Diana was madly in love with Hasnat Khan and wanted to marry him, even if that meant living in Pakistan, and that's one of the reasons why we became friends," she told the magazine.

"She wanted to know how hard it had been for me to adapt to life in Pakistan," she added, in reference to her own marriage to Imran Khan, which took her to Pakistan.

Jemima disclosed that Diana had visited her twice in Pakistan to help raise funds for the hospital where her former husband - a distant cousin of Diana's lover - worked.

"Both times she also went to meet his family secretly to discuss the possibility of marriage to Hasnat," she reveals.

Diana made every effort to get to know the surgeon's family but for a son to marry an Englishwoman "is every conservative Pashtun mother's worst nightmare", Jemima says in the article.

The couple are thought to have discussed the possibility of marriage. But Hasnat Khan apparently told her that "it was a ridiculous idea" and that the only way they could have a normal life would be to move to Pakistan, where the press "don't bother you". The surgeon reportedly revealed this in an interview to the police after Diana's death in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

As her love affair with the doctor began to crumble, Diana began a new relationship with Dodi Al Fayed.

The source of her apparent frustration with the surgeon - his reluctance to marry - was no longer an issue with Al Fayed, who she reportedly believed was going to give her a ring.

She told close friend Rosa Monckton, the former managing director of Tiffany & Co, that the ring was "going firmly on my right hand".

However, according to Monckton, Diana talked much more about Khan than Al Fayed and that the princess pursued the relationship only to make the surgeon jealous.

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Agencies
November 22,2025

indiapak.jpg

New York/Washington: US President Donald Trump has again claimed to have solved the conflict between India and Pakistan, repeating his assertion during a meeting with New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani in the Oval Office.

Mamdani flew to Washington DC for his first meeting with Trump in the White House on Friday. Trump said he “enjoyed” the meeting, which he described as “great.”

During remarks in the Oval Office, with Mamdani standing next to him, Trump repeated his claim that he solved the May conflict between India and Pakistan.

"I did eight peace deals of countries, including India and Pakistan,” he said.

On Wednesday, Trump had said he threatened to put 350 per cent tariffs on India and Pakistan if they did not end their conflict, repeating his claim that he solved the fighting between the nuclear-armed neighbours and that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had called him to say “we're not going to go to war.”

Since May 10, when Trump announced on social media that India and Pakistan had agreed to a “full and immediate” ceasefire after a “long night” of talks mediated by Washington, he has repeated his claim over 60 times that he “helped settle” the tensions between India and Pakistan.

India has consistently denied any third-party intervention. India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7, targeting terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the April 22 Pahalgam attack that killed 26 civilians. India and Pakistan reached an understanding on May 10 to end the conflict after four days of intense cross-border drone and missile strikes.

Mamdani emerged victorious in the closely-watched battle for New York City Mayor, becoming the first South Asian and Muslim to be elected to sit at the helm of the largest city in the US.

He had been the front-runner in the NYC Mayoral election for months and defeated Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa and political heavyweight former New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran as an independent candidate and was officially endorsed by Trump just hours before the elections.

Indian-descent Mamdani is the son of renowned filmmaker Mira Nair and Columbia University professor Mahmood Mamdani. He was born and raised in Kampala, Uganda and moved to New York City with his family when he was 7. Mamdani became a naturalised US citizen only recently, in 2018.

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