AS a nation numbed with grief struggles to contemplate life without Diana, Princess of Wales, the events which led to her death and those of her friend Dodi Fayed and the chauffeur are under close scrutiny.

She was hounded to her death in a Paris underpass by a pack of paparazzi, unscrupulous freelance photographers who will stop at nothing in their quest to obtain personality pictures which will sell on the world market.

They exist because editors and publishers around the world are willing to pay huge sums of money for what they consider to be "the right" pictures of international figures.

And let us be frank. Princess Diana was an industry in herself.

Photographs of her frolicks on a Mediterranean holiday with Dodi Fayed earned hundreds of thousands of dollars for members of the paparazzi when they were auctioned, ironically in Paris.

But editors will only pay large sums of money for pictures they know will boost circulations.

And it is the public at large who boost the sales of mass circulation tabloids and magazines by handing over their money to see those pictures.

For them to hurl abuse at photographers, as many did yesterday in the awful aftermath of the Princess's death, is pure hypocrisy. Those who provide the market trigger the actions of editors and publishers who buy the material.

For Britain to rush head over heels into some sort of privacy legislation would be unwise. Those sort of laws protect the rogues as well as the famous.

And such laws did nothing to help Princess Diana.

She was killed in a country which has some of the most stringent privacy laws in Europe.

But they did not stop members of the paparazzi, who knew full well that pictures of her and Dodi Fayed together would be lapped up by publications across the world.

Even so, editors of the tabloid section of the British national press should be considering their position.

The Princess who won the hearts of nations across the world will be remembered as someone who radiated warmth and love.

Away from the glare of publicity she quietly kept in touch with the parents of children who had died and made follow-up visits to the homes of people she had first met as critically ill patients in hospital. In death she will achieve Evita status, remembered by an adoring public as untarnished and always beautiful.

But her death will also leave the Royal Family with horrendous problems.

It was quite clear she was the greatest asset they ever had. But "the firm" as they like to be called, and especially her husband, failed to appreciate her qualities.

She was treated abominably. There appeared to be an awful undercurrent of jealousy which eventually drove her to suicide attempts.

Our hearts go out to her two young sons. And we sincerely hope that Prince William, heir to the throne, inherits her good qualities.

The Royal Family tried to inhibit a young Princess who brought a breath of fresh air to a stuffy and archaic dynasty.

Her son may well give them another opportunity to improve their image. Let us hope they do not stifle him as well.

The British people will expect Princess Diana's funeral to be a fitting tribute, not a State Funeral and its accompanying pomp, but a ceremony which refelcts the beauty and warmth of the lady she was.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.