According to sources close to Prince Harry, his calls to his father King Charles are going unanswered with their estrangement becoming deeper due to one long-running issue that’s plagued Harry
Prince Harry and King Charles are no longer speaking with one long-running issue seeing their estrangement deepen, a source has claimed.
It had been hoped that father and son were on the road to begin repairing their rift, especially after they met when Harry dashed to the UK after it was announced that Charles had been diagnosed with cancer. However, weeks later when the Duke of Sussex returned to the UK for a 10th anniversary service for the Invictus Games at St Paul’s Cathedral, there was no meeting between the pair.
This raised eyebrows at the time, with a statement from Harry suggesting his father was too busy to see him and reports later claiming the King had offered his son a place to stay in a royal residence.
However, sources close to the Sussex have now claimed that Harry’s calls to his dad are going unanswered as Harry tries to discuss his security arrangements with his father. The Duke has been embroiled in a long-running battle over his security when he comes to the UK after he automatically lost the right to his police protection when he stepped down as a working royal.
He has lost his subsequent court battles to have it reinstated for him, wife Meghan and their two children and is planning an appeal. According to PEOPLE magazine, Harry believes his dad could help to have this reinstated, although this has been dismissed as “wholly inaccurate” by a palace source.
And now a friend of Harry’s told the magazine: “He gets ‘unavailable right now’. His calls go unanswered. He has tried to reach out about the King’s health, but those calls go unanswered too.” While another friend added: “Harry is frightened and feels the only person who can do anything about it is his father,” while another source added: “Harry is determined to protect his own family at all costs.”
They added that the couple “didn’t feel they had a choice”. “The only option was to leave – for their sanity. I do think they thought if they got out of this bubble, there would be less focus on them,” the insider said.
Harry took legal action over the February 2020 decision by the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) which ruled he would no longer be given the “same degree” of publicly-funded protection when in the country. Ravec’s decision came as a result of a change in the duke’s ‘status’ after he stopped being a “full-time working member of the royal family “, a judge was told.
In February, retired High Court judge Sir Peter Lane rejected the duke’s case that he was “singled out” and treated “less favourably” by the decision and concluded Ravec’s approach was not irrational nor procedurally unfair. After the ruling, a legal spokesperson for Harry said in a statement that the Duke “hopes to obtain justice from the Court of Appeal”.
During a hearing at the High Court, it was told that Harry believes his children, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet cannot “feel at home” in the UK if it is “not possible to keep them safe” there. At a previous hearing in the case, in a written statement, Harry said: “It was with great sadness for both of us that my wife and I felt forced to step back from this role and leave the country in 2020. The UK is my home.
“The UK is central to the heritage of my children and a place I want them to feel at home, as much as where they live at the moment in the United States. That cannot happen if it’s not possible to keep them safe when they are on UK soil. I cannot put my wife in danger like that and, given my experiences in life, I am reluctant to unnecessarily put myself in harm’s way too.”
