Prince Harry has come under fire by former Palace staff for making an "outrageous" comparison between his wife and Princess Diana in a new Netflix documentary.
The first three episodes of the six-part series titled Harry & Meghan will be released on Thursday, with the Royal Family said to be bracing for heavy criticism in the show.
Early controversy had already arisen on Monday, after a new trailer showed footage of the late Princess of Wales escaping the paparazzi.
Shortly after the moving image of Diana is shown, the Duke of Sussex can be heard saying: “It’s a dirty game. The pain and suffering of women marrying into this institution - this feeding frenzy.”
This is followed by an extract of Meghan saying she “realised they are never going to protect you”, before Harry continues: “I was terrified. I didn’t want history to repeat itself.”
More images of Princess Diana fleeing photographers are then included after this, alongside sensational newspaper headlines published in the 1990s prior to her death.
But the use of these clips has led several former royal aides to hit out at Harry and Meghan, according to The Telegraph, who say the couple did not experience any incidents of press intrusion in any way comparable to Diana.
Instead, they believe the pair are unfairly equating gossip and negative press with the type of paparazzi "hounding" which regularly followed her.
One claimed the Sussexes had not been open about which exact incidents led them to leave life in Britain for the US because "there's nothing there".
Criticising what they perceived as an emphasis on drama over reality, the source told the newspaper: “This is all a narrative. They say ‘everything changed’, but what do they mean?
“What was so bad that it warrants making a comparison with Princess Diana? They seem to be equating her death with a few negative stories and gossip.”
They added: “Placing it against images of a woman who was hounded in a different era of terrible media and died in a car crash. It’s disgusting.”
The source went on to brand the narrative spun by Harry and Meghan as "lazy" and "outrageous", adding: "It’s as if the facts no longer matter at all.”
The explosive new trailer confirmed that the first volume of episodes will drop this Thursday (December 8), with the next installments coming a week later on December 15.
Another much-talked about segment of the promo clip sees Harry blasting his loved ones, insisting that the Royal Family was not only responsible for "leaking" stories to the papers but also deliberately "planting" them.
Criticism has additionally been aimed at apparently unrelated footage being included in a trailer for the show.
