Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have had ‘no contact’ from Buckingham Palace about an invitation to King Charles’ 75th birthday party next week, their spokesperson told today.
King Charles III is set to celebrate the milestone with a party at Clarence House with his closest friends and family on Tuesday, November 14.
The Sunday Times reported that Prince Harry had turned down an invitation to the birthday bash, and will stay in California. But a spokesperson for the Sussexes told that the couple had no idea about it.
‘There has been no contact regarding an invitation to His Majesty’s upcoming birthday. It is disappointing the Sunday Times has misreported this story,’ they said. The same spokesperson also denied that Meghan, who found fame on Suits, will be making a return to acting following reports earlier this week.
A source close to the Sussexes told that they were not invited to Charles III’s party in London next week. ‘They had not received any invitation and were unaware of any celebrations until the stories came out,’ the insider said, adding: ‘I’m sure the Duke will find a way to reach out privately to wish His Majesty a happy birthday like he has always done’.
A friend of the couple suggested the Palace could even have leaked the ‘snubbing’ story to take attention away from the recent royal visit to Kenya, where the King faced calls to apologise for Britain’s colonial past.
‘The story is being positioned in a way to make it look like the Duke is snubbing his father, which he is not,’ the friend said. ‘Considering the trip [to Kenya] didn’t go well, this might be a welcome distraction.’
Royal and Government sources have been clear that they consider the Kenyan trip last week was a ‘resounding success’.
Prince Harry (pictured, centre with his wife at the Queen’s funeral) has reportedly not spoken to his father, King Charles III, for a long time. The Duke of Sussex’s spokesman has denied he snubbed his father’s 75th birthday
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have bitterly fallen out with the rest of his family over the last few years, since they quit frontline royal duties and emigrated to California
A source close to the couple said Harry (pictured at his father’s coronation) and Meghan had not received an invitation to King Charles’ birthday plans
King Charles is set to celebrate his 75th birthday with a bash at Clarence House next week
A friend of the Sussexes told that they would normally have been included in plans for significant events in the UK, despite the widening gap between themselves and the rest of the royal family.
‘The story in The Times as well as subsequent stories have been positioned in a way to make it look like the Duke is snubbing his father, which he is not.’
Relations have been strained since Prince Harry and Meghan Markle stepped down as senior royals and moved to California.
They made a number of claims about their treatment by the Palace, including in a wide-reaching interview with Oprah and in Harry’s memoir.
Though the Duke since attended the coronation of his father at Westminster Abbey in May, his relationship with King Charles remains fractured – with the Royal Family not publicly noting his birthday in September.
The friend of Harry and Meghan said that the party snub story may have been briefed to distract
However, King Charles and Queen Camilla’s trip to Kenya has been deemed a ‘resounding success’ at Buckingham Palace and within the Government, who had asked the monarch to go to east Africa to strengthen ties between the countries.
It was not marred by protests and the only major criticism appeared to come from the Sussexes’ favoured royal reporter Omid Scobie, who said red carpets for the trip made the King and Queen look ‘out of touch’.
But there were claims that the red carpet treatment was at the insistence of the Kenyan authorities.
The King also took a huge step and told the Kenyan people of his ‘greatest sorrow and deepest regret’ at Britain’s ‘abhorrent and unjustifiable acts of violence’ during the colonial era in a key speech.
At a state banquet in Nairobi on the first night of the four-day visit, Charles said there was ‘no excuse’ for British ‘wrongdoings’ in the East African nation, particularly against the Mau Mau rebellion, which saw 11,000 killed in the 1950s.
The King stopped short of a direct apology, which carries greater legal culpability, because it is not British government policy to do so.
‘Their Royal Highnesses thoroughly enjoyed the trip. I think it’s fair to say it has been a resounding success,’ one aide told Vanity Fair, adding: ‘There is a sense of relief that this went so well and a feeling that the King and Queen have hit the right notes’.
The King and Queen at Fort Jesus, in Mombasa Old Town, during their visit to Kenya last week
Prince Harry (pictured, left) and Meghan Markle (pictured, right) were not spoken to about the party by Buckingham Palace, their spokesperson said
King Charles is set to celebrate his 75th birthday on November 14 at Clarence House
An insider has claimed that the Duke of Sussex didn’t receive any personal well-wishes from his brother, Prince William, or his father King Charles.
In fact, they told The Telegraph: ‘Communications between the King and Prince Harry remain pretty poor. They don’t speak much, if at all.’
They said that one possible reason for this is that King Charles was disappointed with the way that Harry wrote about Queen Camilla in his autobiography, Spare.
The Duke said his stepmother is ‘dangerous’ and a ‘villain’ who left ‘bodies in the street’.
He wrote in Spare: ‘I have complex feelings about gaining a step-parent who I thought had recently sacrificed me on her personal PR altar.’
Harry also accused Charles and Camilla of ‘planting stories’ about William and his family: ‘Give Pa and Camilla an inch, he said, they take a mile.’
He told Good Morning America in an interview shortly after Spare was published: ‘We haven’t spoken for a long time. I love every member of my family, despite the differences.
‘So when I see her, we’re perfectly pleasant with each other. She’s my stepmother. I don’t look at her as an evil stepmother.
‘I see someone who married into this institution, and done everything she can to improve her own reputation and her own image, for her own sake.’
A spokesperson for Buckingham Palace declined to comment, saying that the Palace does not comment on personal family matters.