The royal household has been accused of deliberately planting negative stories about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to deflect from less favourable coverage of other royals as part of “a war against Meghan”.

In the latest trailer for the Sussexes’ controversial Netflix documentary, the duchess’ lawyer Jenny Afia alleges she has seen evidence of briefing from the Palace against the couple.

Ms Afia, of Schillings, says, as footage of Buckingham Palace is shown as she speaks: “There was a real kind of war against Meghan and I’ve certainly seen evidence that there was negative briefing from the Palace against Harry and Meghan to suit other people’s agendas.”

The duchess’s friend Lucy Fraser adds: “Meg became this scapegoat for the Palace. And so they would feed stories on her whether they were true or not to avoid other less favourable stories being printed.”

Meghan says: “You would just see it play out, like a story about someone in my family would pop up for a minute and they’d go ‘We’ve got to kind of make that go away’.

“But there’s real estate on a website homepage, there is real estate there on a newspaper front cover, and something has to be filled in there about someone royal.”

Ms Afia adds: “This barrage of negative articles about the breakdown of the relationship with her father was the final straw in a campaign of negative, nasty coverage about her.”

Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace has declined to comment.