27/03/2023
Prince Harry, youngest son of Carlos III, known for his fight against the British tabloid press, appeared by surprise Monday at a court hearing against the Daily Mail in London, six weeks before his father’s coronation.
Since he and his wife, Meghan Markle, they shook the monarchy by announcing that they left their official functions and went to live in California In 2020, the 38-year-old prince travels to the United Kingdom on a few occasions that always arouse strong expectations.
On Monday in the morning, To everyone’s surprise, he arrived in a taxi at the British capital’s courthouse. He went to a room in the High Court of London and sat in the back, where in the afternoon he was joined by the pop legend Elton John76 years old.
Together with the actress Liz Hurley, they lead a group of seven plaintiffs accusing the Associated Newspapers group, publisher of the Daily Mail, of illegally gathering information through detectives, listening to their conversations in their cars or at their homes.
Most of the accusations date back to the period between 1993 and 2011, although some facts are from 2018.
Among them are “illegal interception of voice messages, wiretapping, obtaining private information such as billss of telephone or medical data using deception”, affirmed the lawyer David Sherborne.
Associated Newspapers “fully and unequivocally refuted these absurd smears” when the lawsuit was announced in early October and on Monday, in the first of four scheduled days of visits that will continue Tuesday, he tried to get the case dropped.
Attacks on the royal family
The prince’s surprise appearance in London takes place at just over a month from her father’s coronation ceremony, on May 6.
He and Meghan, who are still Dukes of Sussex Although since 2020 they cannot use their Royal Highness titles or officially represent the British monarchy, they were invited to the ceremony.
This will be held with great pomp at Westminster Abbey, in central London, in the presence of dozens of heads of state and government and representatives of monarchies from around the world.
Yet still The presence of the controversial couple has not been confirmed.
The last time they were seen publicly in the UK was at Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral last September.
His eventual return to the country has been the subject of much speculation in recent months, after the virulent attacks they launched against the royal family.
In December, Netflix aired a six-part documentary titled “Harry & Meghan” in which they settled accounts with the British media and with members of royaltyespecially with William, Harry’s older brother and 40-year-old heir to the throne, whose press team they accused of having turned public opinion against him.
Then in January Harry published a controversial memoir which, under the title of “In the shade”, recounted sordid details of his life within the British royal family and his bad relations with his father and brother.
According to the British press, the prince does not expect to meet either of them in the coming days.
Traumatized since adolescence by the death of his mother, Princess Diana, in a traffic accident in Paris in 1997 when she was being chased by the paparazzi, Harry argued against the unbearable pressure of the tabloid press to leave the monarchy.
Claiming that Meghan, who is mixed race, had been the target of racist attacks and death threats on social media, she stated that she did not want to see her mother’s story repeat itself.
The couple, who have two children, Archie, 3, and Lilibet, 1, have launched several lawsuits against British tabloids they accuse of violating their privacy rights.