Saudi prince wins legal battle against hefty payout to late king's 'secret wife'

London: Late Saudi King Fahd’s son has won a court battle against his father’s ‘secret wife’ and will not be paying the multi-million pound payout she had won in a court case last November.

Janan Harb claimed she was secretly married to late king Fahd and Judge Peter Smith had ruled that was entitled to more than 15 million ($23 million/21 million euros), plus the deeds to two plush London flats, thought to be worth 5 million each.

The judge had accepted that the absolute ruler's son Prince Abdul Aziz bin Fahd had struck such an agreement with Harb but the lawyers representing the Prince decided to appeal against the ruling and have asked the court to ‘quash’ the award handed to her.

Harb has claimed that the Prince had agreed to ‘buy her silence’ with the payout, but Abdul Aziz has denied entering any such agreement with her. His lawyers now want a new judge to hear the case and have accused Judge Peter Smith of ‘bias’ in the case and of failing to examine evidence properly.

Born to a Christian Palestinian family, Harb, 69, is now a British national.

She says she was secretly married to Fahd in 1968 when she was 19 and he was a prince and the interior minister.

Harb claimed Fahd, who became king in 1982 and died in 2005, had promised to provide for her financially for the rest of her life.

She claimed Abdul Aziz told her in 2003 that he was prepared to honour his father's promise, and had offered to give her 12 million plus the deeds to the two flats by the River Thames.

She took legal action after claiming she had received neither the money nor the properties.