Prince Harry will not be staying at Buckingham Palace during his visit to the UK
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Prince Harry will not stay at Buckingham Palace during his stay in Britain this week, the palace said, although a spokesman for the second son of the King told the media on Monday that he had accepted an invitation to do so.
The BBC reported that Harry had not formally responded to the request for royal accommodation by the deadline, and was told over the weekend that he would no longer be able to stay at Buckingham Palace in central London.
The prince’s visits to London and Birmingham for a series of charity talks have fueled speculation over whether the non-resident royal will spend time with his father, King Charles, or stay in the royal palace.
But the design of the trip has been overshadowed by a row with the government over security, and the prince’s spokesman said on Sunday that Harry’s wife, Meghan, and children Archie, 7, and Lilibet, 5, would not be accompanying him on the trip to London, but could join him later when he visited Birmingham.
“On a trip that was supposed to be about the Atticus Games and about his children coming to the UK for the first time in four years, it has become a huge security issue,” British journalist Victoria Murphy, who has covered the Royal Family for 15 years, told CBC News.
Harry, a British military veteran who served in Afghanistan, planned the trip to mark a year before the Invictus Games, a Paralympic-style competition he founded to inspire and motivate war veterans around the world as they try to overcome battlefield injuries. The event was held in British Columbia last year, and is scheduled to be held in Birmingham next year.
Harry has lived in the United States since 2020 with his American wife Meghan, after stepping down as members of the royal family, expressing a desire to be financially independent and to escape what they see as media interference in their private lives.
Blanket immunity rights are over
In the six years since then, the depth of bad blood between Harry and his father and brother has become clear, revealed publicly in interviews given by Harry and in his autobiography, Savewhich included an unflattering portrayal of the family and serious allegations of a toxic relationship between the monarchy and the media.
Charles, who is still being treated for cancer, has not seen his two grandchildren since they were born but Harry said in May last year that he wanted the fighting to stop.
In emotional testimony against the publisher of Britain’s Daily Mail magazine, Prince Harry accused the company of making his wife Meghan Markle’s life ‘an absolute misery.’ This case also affects celebrities including Elton John and Elizabeth Hurley.
Harry’s spokesman had previously said he would live in a mixed royal and private residence.
Murphy said the optics are not good for the Royals as “we have a situation here where a lot of things are in the public eye and they have to put things out there to get their side.”
British authorities say that Harry does not have the right to be protected by the cloak because he is no longer a working member of the royal family and they will assess his safety on a case-by-case basis, just like any other celebrity. Harry says it is not safe for his children to go to Britain without protection because his family is always targeted because of their royal position.
The decision rests with the government’s Royal and VIP Executive Committee (RAVEC), which decides who should receive government-sponsored security.
“The public events that he does are the public events of his national charities, so they create a lot of debate,” Murphy said. “You want this guaranteed police protection [but] he knew when he announced that he was going to come here to bring his children here that he didn’t have that.”
Not in a formal setting, but more in the light of the media, is the decision on Tuesday at the High Court in London, where the judge will reveal his decision in Harry’s invasion of privacy case against the publisher of the Daily Mail.
The decision, Murphy said, “will definitely come down to today and maybe even later depending on what it is.”
