Harry and Meghan Markle remain silent as ‘royal racists’ named in Omid Scobie’s book

Rishi Sunak refrained from commenting on a royal controversy surrounding allegations of racism while commending the King for his role in international climate talks.

Asked about the controversy as he flew to Dubai for the Cop28 climate talks, Mr Sunak told reporters: “By longstanding and appropriate convention it wouldn’t be right for me to talk about the royal family in any way shape or form.”

He praised the climate-conscious King and highlighted the UK’s leadership at the climate summit.
“I’m delighted that he’s going to be at Cop tomorrow, he’s giving a call to arms in the opening statement,” Mr Sunak said.

“It speaks volumes about our type of leadership as a country that we’ve got our head of state there, delivering a call to arms in the opening statement which speaks volumes about the respect that he’s got on this issue around the world.

“We’ve got the head of government there in me, and we’ve got our chief diplomat there in the Foreign Secretary. There are very few countries that will be able to say what I’ve just said.

“So that speaks again to our leadership on this issue and particularly His Majesty’s longstanding track record championing this issue and I’m delighted that he’s going to be delivering this very important statement tomorrow.”

The monarchy has suffered “long-lasting reputational damage” and it is going to affect the whole family as well as the institutions, a royal commentator has said.

Joe Little of Majesty magazine said that the doubts are enough to cause damage to the royal family and monarchy as a whole due to the racism row.

“The allegations, true or untrue, will clearly put doubt in the minds of people who are aware of the individuals who have been named. That can’t be helpful in any shape or form.

“But mud sticks, once the shadow of doubt is there, it never really goes away, and it’s got to impact not only on the individuals but also the institution as a whole – it’s a long-lasting reputational damage,” he said.

Omid Scobie singled out King Charles III and the Prince of Wales after it appeared that “not one member” of the royal family contacted the Duke and Duchess of Sussex following their “near-catastrophic” car chase through New York City earlier this year:

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have been urged to defend King Charles and Princess Camilla, sources close to the family said, amid a racism row.

A source close to the royal family has called on the Sussexes to speak out and defend their relatives as their silence is “deafening”, according to The Telegraph.

“For the couple that talked about ‘death by a thousand no comments’, the silence at this point is deafening,” the source said.

Another individual characterised the choice to refrain from addressing the allegations as “interesting”, particularly considering that the Sussexes had previously lodged multiple complaints about lacking defense against unfavourable media coverage during their time at the palace.

It comes as public figures are pressuring the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to speak out as the pair have remained silent over accusations that the King and the Queen raised concerns about the skin colour of Prince Harry and Meghan’s son, Archie, before he was born.

The King looked animated when speaking to PM Rishi Sunak at the Dubai climate talks, where he set out an action plan for tackling the climate crisis.

Omid Scobie’s hit piece against the royal family has distracted attention from the effort to fight climate change, writes Sean O’Grady:

These are some of the biggest alleged revelations from Endgame:

Sources close to the Duchess of Sussex, who allegedly wrote in letters to King Charles the names of the two family members she accused of ‘racist’ comments, have insisted that she ‘never intended them to be publicly identified’ and that they were ‘not leaked to Mr Scobie by anyone in her camp’, according to The Daily Telegraph.