Richie's ex wants £2m a year

Lionel Richie's love songs have made women swoon for decades. He must be losing his touch.

The veteran soul star was yesterday hit with a divorce demand for £ 2million a year by his estranged wife.

Diana Richie says she needs £165,000 a month to fund her lifestyle.

She needs the cash for 'personal services, entertainment and shopping', including £11,000 a year for plastic surgery and more than £46,000 a month for personal expenses.

The court papers offer a rare insight into the couple's decadent lives.

' The respondent and I had an extraordinary extravagant lifestyle,' says 37-year-old Mrs Richie. 'We regularly spent £165,000 a month.

'We could comfortably afford to spend unlimited sums of money on everything and anything we chose. I had no limit on what I could spend. The respondent has always encouraged me to spend as much money as I want on beauty treatments, clothing etc.'

The payments would also go towards the upkeep of their daughter Sofia, five, and nine-year-old son Miles.

A Beverly Hills home, worth more than £20million, and staff will also be maintained.

Richie - whose hits include Hello and Dancing On The Ceiling - met his wife at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, where she was a dancer.

They separated in October last year, with Mrs Richie citing 'irreconcilable differences'. Her husband, the former Commodores frontman, has sold nearly 100million albums in a career spanning 40 years. He is believed to earn up to £550,000 a performance.

His adopted daughter Nicole, 22, stars in TV show The Simple Life.