In a rare interview, Corinna Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein told the BBC how the monarch tried to win her back two years after giving her the money and 'went ballistic' when she spurned him and demanded his millions back. Juan Carlos, 82, a notorious Lothario who has been married to Queen Sofia since , carried out an affair with the Danish-born businesswoman from to In , their romance was sensationally discovered when he fractured his hip and had to be rushed back home from an elephant hunting trip in Botswana where Ms Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein - still a close friend - had accompanied him.
That colossal transfer of funds is now the subject of a Swiss inquiry. At the start of this month, Juan Carlos announced he was leaving Spain and it has recently emerged that he is staying in Abu Dhabi.
Ms Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein says their affair began in and ended in I felt that King Juan Carlos was trying to get me to come back to him, and I didn't want to give a false impression. I almost had premonitions about this trip. She concludes that the media circus which followed was masterminded by the royal establishment, who wanted to 'speed up an abdication' and have her out of the picture. First, she claims, her Monaco apartment was ransacked and then on a business trip to Brazil she was tailed.
An anonymous threat was made about there being 'many tunnels between Monaco and Nice' - a reference to Princess Diana's fatal car crash. Furthermore, she claimed a book about the British royal's death was left out in the living room of her Swiss apartment. The operative, a dear friend of Juan Carlos, told her 'he was sent by the king' to warn her against talking to the media.
She told the BBC that she'd been 'very surprised' to receive the funds but flew to Madrid to thank the king, who she believes felt guilty about how her flat in Monaco had been ransacked and the visit by the CNI. In testimony provided to a Swiss prosecutor, Ms Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein said that the colossal transfer was an act of love.
