What realm is Prince Harry inhabiting as he chooses to admonish Putin and Trump just before King Charles embarks on a monumental visit to America?
Observing his speech at the Kyiv Security Forum during an unannounced trip, I found myself torn between amusement and disbelief when he claimed, with utmost sincerity, ‘I am not here as a politician.’
‘I stand here as a soldier familiar with service and as a humanitarian who has witnessed the devastating toll of war.’ With these words, he boldly criticized both Presidents Putin and Trump, two of the globe’s most influential figures.
The notion that this seemingly oblivious and misguided individual believes he possesses the authority to admonish global leaders—or that his words should be taken with any degree of seriousness—is almost comedic.
It’s not that I hold any particular regard for Trump or Putin; both are undeniably daunting figures.
But Harry’s absurd intervention in world affairs isn’t just the folly of a foolish prince who decided to jot down some thoughts while idling away the hours at his sun-kissed multi-million dollar Montecito mansion.
Its cynical timing smacks to me of naked opportunism.
For he appears to have timed it to coincide – dare I say it, overshadow – his father King Charles’ and Queen Camilla’s historic visit to America next week.
Even as the King is about to attempt to repair the fragile Special Relationship between Britain and the US by meeting Trump in Washington, his idiotic son is aiming pot shots at the President.
Watching Prince Harry address the Kyiv Security Forum on a secret visit, I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry, writes Amanda Platell. He said in all solemnity: ‘I am not here as a politician’
Prince Harry on a visit to members of the Halo Trust in Ukraine during his secret visit. The timing smacks of naked opportunism
By doing so he could be undermining perhaps the monarchy’s most important role of all – the execution of soft power and diplomacy in the absence of politics.
But then Harry, whose main occupation seems either to be surfing or feeding his organic chooks, is too stupid to understand that.
Again, his conviction that his is a voice worth listening to about complex world affairs is a laugh out loud moment.
Yes, he was a soldier who did reach the unremarkable rank of Captain and who served in the British Army for ten years. Yes, he completed two tours of duty in Afghanistan and flew an Apache helicopter. Yes, he ‘cares’ about the world – and tells us so ad nauseam, as if none of the rest of us do.
He also insists that he will always be a member of the Royal Family, denies he is no longer a working royal and that he was ‘born to do activism work’.
Rather different to the late Queen’s statement of 2020 which declared: ‘The Sussexes will not use their HRH titles as they are no longer working members of the Royal Family.’
And, how brave of him to address Russia’s leader directly! ‘President Putin, no nation benefits from the continued loss of life we are witnessing,’ he thundered. And I am sure Putin is quaking in his boots.
Harry has badly misjudged the situation. Slag off the US President on the eve of his father’s historic visit? Does he have a single brain cell still working?
Oh, and he has stinging criticism for the US leadership too.
‘The United States has a singular role in this story. Not only because of its power,’ he said, adding that this is ‘a moment for American leadership to show it can honour its international treaty obligations – not out of charity, but of its enduring role in global security and strategic stability’.
It is pathetic. Worse than that, it looks like a desperate attempt to grab the headlines before his father’s visit to the States, and to play the statesman he believes is his right because of his gilded and privileged existence.
And the timing couldn’t be worse as relations between the US and Keir Starmer over the Iran war are at rock-bottom.
If Harry thought his intervention would garner support, he has badly misjudged the situation. Slag off the US President on the eve of his father’s historic visit? Does he have a single brain cell still working?
But then this soft lad, who got a B in art and a D in geography in his A-Levels, probably couldn’t even spell The Strait of Hormuz without a Google search, let alone pinpoint it on a map.
President Trump responded to Harry’s speech with his usual candour and unusual humour saying what we Brits think of his intervention that ‘Prince Harry does not speak for the UK’, adding: ‘I think I’m speaking for the UK more than Prince Harry.’
The tragedy is that, had Harry taken up his role as a working royal, and worked hard at it, he could have been taken seriously, as other members of the family are.
But he chose to skip the hard work and head off to the sun with his Little Miss Montecito to milk the family name. No wonder that when he thinks he can fly in from California to lecture world leaders, he is received with open derision and disdain.
Devil of a dilemma
Actress Anne Hathaway at the premiere for The Devil Wears Prada 2
The perceived Tinseltown wisdom is that the more of a turkey they fear a movie will be, the more times its stars are required to prostrate themselves in glamorous photo-ops promoting it.
Which is worrying because I’ve bought two tickets to see The Devil Wears Prada 2 at the cinema, starring 43-year-old youngsters Anne Hathaway and Emily Blunt alongside Meryl Streep, 76, and Stanley Tucci, 65 – and they’ve not been out of the news flogging it across the globe.
Please let the film’s only turkeys be Meryl and Stanley’s necks.
The lovely video Kate and William released of Prince Louis playing cricket to mark his eighth birthday makes you wonder why we still haven’t seen the faces of the Sussexes’ children.
No doubt they are holding out for a ‘reveal’ in a Netflix documentary.
Asylum predators
It is repellent that three asylum seekers from Iran and Egypt who arrived here – despite one of them being a convicted murderer – were housed in hotels by the Government only to gang-rape a young woman on Brighton beach.
In court we heard they’d filmed the attack, while laughing and spitting on her. They’ve got what they came for, free board and lodging in the UK – albeit in a prison where I hope real justice will be meted out to them by hardened lifers.
Carey is still fresh as a Daisy
Carey Mulligan as Daisy Buchanan in The Great Gatsby, left, and at an event this month
Promoting her lead role in the compellingly awful Netflix drama Beef, Carey Mulligan, 40, warns women of the dangers of succumbing to modern pressures for tweakments or cosmetic surgery, and says we should accept ourselves for how we are and age naturally.
She was 25 when she began filming The Great Gatsby, in which she played Daisy, above left, and thanks no doubt to yoga, mindfulness and deep breathing, she doesn’t look a day older in Beef… 15 years later!
Am I the only one underwhelmed by Victoria Beckham’s new Gap collaboration?
Checking my wardrobe I already have two denim jackets, multiple pairs of jeans, two trench coats and white T-shirts.
Anyone dumb enough to fork out £25 for a white VB Tee when you can already get Gap’s classic white crew-neck for £12 needs their head read.
After unfunny comedian Jack Whitehall’s wedding to model Roxy Horner at Euridge Manor, in Wiltshire, neighbours of the estate’s owner John Robinson, founder of Jigsaw, complained of loud noise and ‘jeering’. That was just wedding guests groaning over Jack’s terrible jokes.
Extraordinary that 30 years after the movie Babe – about a pig who thought he was a sheepdog – a piglet from Buckinghamshire called Theo (pictured) proves what the film’s Farmer Hoggett always believed: ‘Pig’ was as intelligent as any dog.
Theo can fly over jumps and obeys owner Olivia Mikhail’s commands. As Hoggett said at the end of the film: ‘That’ll do, Pig. That’ll do.
New movie Michael (as in Jackson) opens this weekend and is predicted to make $150million at the global box office.
Yet it tells the story of his rise to becoming the biggest star in the world without a word about the accusations of serial child sex abuse.
You do wonder about Jackson’s fans still clinging to their hero after he’s been shown to be not just mad but bad and completely off the wall.
Ahead of his trial in October on rape and sexual assault charges which date from 1999 to 2009, Russell Brand admits to having ‘exploitative’ sex with a girl of 16 when he was 30, but says it was consensual and therefore legal.
What should bother us more? That he is so blasé about the encounter, that he still has five million Insta followers – or that it’s taken so many years for his case to come to court?
Hunter’s deadly pursuit
Millionaire American big-game hunter Ernie Dosio, 75, was killed by five rampaging elephants while hunting antelope in Africa.
They say he never stood a chance. But then, none of his trophy kills did either from his high-powered rifle.
Maybe it’s true what they say, that elephants never forget.
If there is any solace after Wendy Duffy, 56, took her life at a Swiss clinic because she never recovered from the death of her son Marcus, it is that she didn’t suddenly disappear as my granddad Pop did.
He took his life in his 60s after Nan died. Wendy acted with compassion, telling her family of her decision. Pop’s five daughters spent years searching for an explanation. I hope Wendy now has her son in her arms in Heaven.
Lawyers for Ghislaine Maxwell insist there is a ‘good chance’ her long-term friend Donald Trump will give the convicted sex trafficker and madam of paedophile Jeffrey Epstein a Presidential pardon.
Not if ‘grab them by the p***y’ Donald wants to lose the entire female vote at the next election he won’t.
Farewell to the BBC’s Football Focus, axed amid claims of going woke. Many blamed its host Alex Scott, but the sad truth is most footie fans are still men who don’t want to hear a woman’s views. Even one with as distinguished a football career as Alex.
