Meghan is very similar to Princess Diana, says Harry: ‘She has this warmth about her’

The Duke of Sussex compared the Duchess of Sussex to his late mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, in the couple’s new Netflix documentary series.

Prince Harry said that Meghan Markle has the “same compassion”, “empathy”, and “confidence” as Diana, as he opened up about how he wanted to “protect” his family from his mother’s tragic fate.

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In the first episode of the series, Harry and Meghan, which aired on Netflix on Thursday morning (8 December), Harry said: “So much of what Meghan is, and how she is, is so similar to my mum. She has the same compassion, she has the same empathy, she has the same confidence. She has this warmth about her.”

As he spoke, the episode featured clips of Meghan and Diana were interspersed with one another. A clip of Diana holding a young Harry on her hip as she walked behind Prince William played before a clip showing Meghan and the couple’s son Archie, holding hands and running in a garden.

Another video showed Meghan holding Archie in her arms and rubbing her nose against his and he holds her face. This was followed by a clip of Diana holding Harry in a similar way, with his face close to hers.

Over a video of one of Harry and Meghan’s children babbling at a photo of Diana, a voiceover by Harry said: “I accept that there’ll be people around the world who fundamentally disagree with what I’ve done and how I’ve done it, but I knew that I had to do everything I could to protect my family.

“Especially after what happened to my mum. You know, I didn’t want history to repeat itself,” he added.

Diana died in a car accident in Paris in 1997, when she was 36 years old. Harry was 12 years old at the time of her death.

The crash has been blamed on paparazzi, who had been following the princess while driving through Paris. It also resulted in the deaths of Diana’s boyfriend, Dodi Fayed, and her chauffeur, Henri Paul.

Harry also claimed that men in the royal family have a “temptation or urge to marry someone who fits in the mould, as opposed to somebody who you are perhaps destined to be with”.

He added: “The difference between making decisions with your head, or your heart. And my mum [Diana] made most of her decisions, if not all of them, from her heart. And I am my mother’s son.”

Harry and Meghan is available to watch on Netflix now.