Princess Diana’s former lover James Hewitt has hit out at former BBC reporter Martin Bashir and claims he made him “the most hated man in the world”.

The former British Army cavalry officer, who disclosed a five-year extra-marital affair with Diana, which ended in 1991, has slammed Bashir for taking advantage of the late princess in a new interview.

He claims Bashir was a “toad” and tricked Diana into confirming the affair took place in the infamous 1995 Panorama interview that recently saw Bashir the subject of an inquiry.

Mr Hewitt told the Sun : “I think the chap needs to seriously search his conscience. To do it by deception is unforgivable and there is very little road back from that. I don’t know him personally, but I think any underhandedness — and particularly if it’s taking advantage of someone’s weakness and being a toad — is wrong. It did affect me and it had a huge effect.

“I hope people realise that the whole of the programme should be seen for what it was — and that was to deceive somebody into saying things and doing things that they may not necessarily have been willing to say had all the facts been known. It was not good for anybody except BBC figures and Martin Bashir’s career. It wasn’t exposing anything, it was just using lies and half-truths.”

Princess Diana and James Hewitt in the 1990s ( 
Image:
Ron Dadswell/REX/Shutterstock)
In the infamous chat with Bashir, Diana discussed her break-up with the then-Prince Charles. She told Bashir: “Yes, I was in love with him, but I was very let down.”

A recent inquiry found Bashir used “deceitful means” to bag the interview, including drop-feeding the princess false claims about her friends and staff.

Mr Hewitt, now 66, now hopes the inquiry’s findings have given the public a better understanding of the situation and put the story in a different context.

James Hewitt in 2004 ( 
Image:
Getty Images)
He claims the backlash turned him into an international pariah at the time and permanently damaged his reputation. And he insists he first met Diana two years after Prince Harry was born.

Meanwhile, his dream of having children of his own has been ruined by his being known as Diana’s lover, and branded a “cad”. He told the paper it is difficult to see it happening now and he believes he was once the most hated man in the world.

Mr Hewitt has in recent years suffered some serious health issues. In 2017 he suffered a stroke after open heart surgery. He was given a 20 per cent chance of surviving after he contracted an infection which affected a valve in his heart. He was left paralysed on his left-hand side and claims it took half a year for the feeling to return.

Diana, Princess of Wales, during her interview with Martin Bashir for the BBC in 1995 ( 
Image:
PA)
He also suffered a septic embolism and lost a clementine-sized ball from the frontal lobe of his brain, spending five months in hospital after being told he could have died if he’d remained untreated for one more day.

An independent investigation in 2021 by Supreme Court Judge John Dyson found Bashir used deceitful methods in securing his Panorama interview with Diana.

A report into the interview concluded that Bashir acted inappropriately and in serious breach of BBC guidelines.

Martin Bashir in 2019 ( 
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It read: “I have also concluded that, without justification, the BBC covered up in its press logs such facts as it had been able to establish about how Mr Bashir secured the interview and failed to mention the issue at all on any news programme and thereby fell short of the high standards of integrity and transparency which are its hallmark.”

The now infamous and explosive interview in 1995 featured Diana saying: “Well, there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”