LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The media are harassing Meghan Markle just as they did Princess Diana, who was killed in a car crash while being pursued by paparazzi, her friend George Clooney said.

Clooney and his wife Amal attended Meghan’s wedding to Prince Harry, Diana’s son, last year when the American actress became the newest addition to the British royal family.

The Duchess of Sussex as she is now known, is expecting her first child, something that has intensified already huge media interest.

“They’re just chasing Meghan Markle everywhere, she’s been pursued and vilified,” Clooney told Australian magazine WHO.

“She’s a woman who is seven months pregnant and she has been pursued and vilified and chased in the same way that Diana was and it’s history repeating itself,” Clooney said.

Last weekend, some media published details of an intimate letter they said Meghan has sent her estranged father.

“I can’t tell you how frustrating that is,” Clooney said.

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“Just seeing them broadcast a letter from a daughter to a father, she’s getting a raw deal there and I think it’s irresponsible and I’m surprised by that.”

Last month, five of Meghan’s close friends told People magazine the duchess had endured “lies and untruths” and “global bullying” and they worried how this would affect her and her baby.

In 2016, shortly after their relationship became public, Prince Harry issued a rare statement criticizing the media for intruding into Meghan’s private life, saying the press had subjected her to “a wave of abuse and harassment”.

Harry and his elder brother Prince William, the second in line to the throne, have had a strained relationship with the press since their mother, Princess Diana, was killed in a car crash in Paris in 1997 while being chased by paparazzi on motorbikes.