Queen Elizabeth has issued strict instructions to the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, that he should remain in the background when the royal family gathers to mark the first anniversary of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, it was reported yesterday.
The British Prime Minister and his wife, Cherie, will be guests of the queen at her Scottish estate of Balmoral on August 31st.
The Sunday Telegraph said Buckingham Palace was deeply concerned that Blair would upstage the royal family when they gather at the local Crathie Church with comments similar to his "People's Princess" speech in the aftermath of the Paris crash. The palace has asked for assurances from Downing Street that the Prime Minister will only be seen - and not heard.
Music celebrities yesterday joined a march to urge the world's superpowers to back Princess Diana's campaign to ban landmines. Singer Robbie Williams, and All Saints band members Natalie and Nicole Ap- pleton and Melanie Blatt joined a 15-minute stretch of the twoand-a-half hour People's Procession for a worldwide ban on landmines.
The London march filed past the Chinese and US embassies and the Russian Federation Consulate, calling for these countries to sign the Ottawa Treaty which outlaws the sale and use of antipersonnel mines.
The family of rock star Michael Hutchence said yesterday there were outraged at reports that his former lover Paula Yates was having an affair with an ex-heroin addict.
"We are greatly surprised at the headlines," his father, Kelland Hutchence, told reporters.
The British Sun said Yates (38) met Kingsley O'Keke (28) at the rehabilitation clinic where she was undergoing grief counselling after Hutchence was found dead in a Sydney hotel room last November. She was treated for a nervous breakdown earlier this year.
Yates's daughter by the Australian star, two-year-old Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily, has been staying in Sydney while her mother was in treatment. News of the affair casts doubt over her continued custody of the baby, Australian reports said. Yates is already locked in a custody battle with former husband Bob Geldof over their three children.
Italian film legend Sophia Loren, who is resting in a New York hospital after suffering from stress, will not attend the Venice film festival where she had been due to receive a lifetime achievement award, her husband, Carlo Ponti, was quoted as saying yesterday.
On Saturday, Ponti said there was no truth to reports that the 63-year-old Oscar winner had suffered heart problems while visiting a plastic surgeon.