- (AFP) -- The office of Prince Charles has rejected as
"untrue" unpublished allegations levelled at the heir to the
British throne in the latest twist to a bewildering saga that is rocking
the monarchy.
-
- In a late-night statement Thursday, the London residence
of the Prince of Wales denied that a former royal employee had witnessed
"an incident some years ago involving a senior member of the royal
family".
-
- "The allegation is untrue," said the statement
from Clarence House as the prince continued a visit to the Gulf state of
Oman.
-
- "The incident which the former employee claims to
have witnessed did not take place," it added.
-
- It's not known exactly what that incident was, after
the High Court slapped an injunction last Saturday on the mass-circulation
Mail on Sunday newspaper to stop it from publishing the details.
-
- A second injunction barred the Guardian newspaper from
revealing the identity of the former royal employee who took out the injunction
against the Mail on Sunday.
-
- That second injunction was overturned Thursday, enabling
the Guardian on its website to immediately name the staffer -- Michael
Fawcett, who resigned last March as the prince's trusted aide after being
cleared of financial wrongdoing.
-
- With so few details in the public domain, speculation
this week has alluded to a sex scandal.
-
- It was the Mail on Sunday that quoted a former royal
valet, George Smith, last November as saying he told Princess Diana, Charles'
ex-wife, in 1996 that he was raped several years earlier by one of Charles'
aides.
-
- Diana died the following year after a Paris car crash,
but Smith claimed that she had made a tape recording of their conversation.
-
- When Smith made his rape claim, a spokesman for Charles
replied that it had been fully investigated by police in 2001-2002, and
that "no evidence was forthcoming" to back it up.
-
- In its Thursday's statement, Clarence House did not identify
by name who was behind the latest allegation. But it did say that he had
been a Falklands War veteran -- which Smith was -- who has suffered from
post-traumatic stress disorder and alcoholism.
-
- Speaking on television Thursday, Charles' private secretary
Sir Michael Peat acknowledged it was "rather unusual" to deny
an allegation that hasn't come out into the public domain.
-
- "However, this allegation is becoming common currency
... and I just want to make it entire clear, even though I can't refer
to the specifics ... that it is totally untrue and without a shred of substance,"
he said.
-
- He also said that Prince William and Prince Harry, Charles'
two sons by Diana, "have been kept informed" and were "supportive"
of their father.
-
- Both young men recoiled in October when yet another former
royal servant, Paul Burrell, published his memoirs of his years as their
mother's trusted butler, and accused him of betrayal.
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- Burrell was put on trial last year for allegedly stealing
some of Diana's possessions, but the case fell apart when Queen Elizabeth
II revealed that he had told her that he had some Diana belongings.
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- On its front page Friday, the Guardian -- which challenged
the second injunction because it feared the courts were shielding Fawcett
because of his royal ties -- said it wasn't going to reveal the mystery
allegation.
-
- "Not only do they differ from the highly coloured
rumours about royal affairs which have surfaced recently in the tabloids,"
it said, "but we also have no reason to believe the allegations are
true."
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