Owner of white Fiat Uno refuses to give evidence at Diana inquest

Le Van Thanh, a Parisian taxi driver, owned a white Fiat Uno identical to the one that struck Diana's Mercedes seconds before it smashed into a concrete pillar.

The coroner, Lord Justice Scott-Baker, believes he holds crucial information about what took place in the Alma tunnel ten years ago.

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But despite officers from the Metropolitan Police's Operation Paget making more than one formal approach to Le Van Thanh, he is adamant that he will not help.

He told The Mail on Sunday: "It happened a long time ago. I do not want to speak about this ever."

British police do not have the power to compel Le Van Thanh to give evidence because he is a French citizen.

The second-generation Vietnamese immigrant was quizzed by the Paris Criminal Brigade three months after the crash and released after six hours.

His statements, which are now in the possession of the Coroner, show he gave contradictory accounts of when he resprayed his Fiat Uno red.

Initially Le Van Thanh said he and his brother, a Citroen mechanic, did the work the day before the crash on August 31, 1997. He then admitted that it was done the day after.

The Paget report into the crash, written by Lord Stevens and published earlier this year, refers to an unnamed Fiat Uno driver who was seen by the Paris Criminal Brigade.

The former Metropolitan Police Commissioner said the French ruled out the driver after deciding the paint on his car was different from that found on the Mercedes.

But Lord Stevens said that British forensic scientists disagreed, saying the car should not have been ruled out.

French investigators also said that a new rear tail light had not been fitted on the car - shards from a broken one were found at the crash scene.

Lord Stevens pointed out that the owner could have replaced it with a second-hand light.

A Mail on Sunday investigation has established that Lord Stevens was referring to Le Van Thanh.

His father admitted that his sons resprayed the car in the middle of the night, hours after an identical white Fiat Uno fled the scene of the crash five miles away.

British detectives know a Fiat Uno was involved because white paint found on the Mercedes matched that used exclusively on models produced between 1983 and 1987.

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Eyewitnesses also described a man driving a small car who had a large dog sitting in the back seat - at the time Le Van Thanh owned two Dobermanns.

A source said: "The evidence points to the Fiat having struck the Merc a glancing blow.

"It would not have caused the Merc to hit the pillar. But we believe it was sufficient to panic Mr Fayed's driver Henri Paul who, as we all know, had been drinking.

"Trevor Rees-Jones, Diana's bodyguard, sustained a serious head injury and has no memory of what happened.

"Potentially the driver of the Fiat Uno could end all the conspiracy talk and describe what was a simple accident. Unfortunately Mr Le Van Thanh steadfastly refuses to co-operate."

Jean Claude Mules, the police officer who was in charge of the French investigation, astonishingly admitted it had been "a good thing" that the Uno driver was never found, saying that the motorist would have been tarred as Diana's killer.

His startling admission will again give rise to the suspicion that the Paris Criminal Brigade was not interested in tracing the driver, with several officers said to have resented the huge resources being used to investigate what they saw as a simple accident.

Prince Harry recently said in a documentary that he still wonders what happened in the tunnel that night, a question that Le Van Thanh could potentially answer.

Blood tests have established that Henri Paul was three times over the drink-drive limit and Le Van Thanh could recount what happened without incriminating himself.

But, pressed on whether he would help Operation Paget, he replied: "No I will not. I have nothing more to say. It's over."