Queen gave Harry messages for Invictus athletes at meeting ahead of games

The Duke of Sussex has said it was “great” to see the Queen who gave him messages for British Invictus Games athletes when he met with her last week.

Harry and Meghan visited the Queen and met with the Prince of Wales in Windsor on Thursday, having flown in from their home in the US before travelling on to The Hague in The Netherlands for the games.

It is the first time the couple had been seen together publicly on this side of the Atlantic for two years.

When asked about the Queen in an interview during the BBC’s coverage of the event, he said: “She had plenty of messages for Team UK which I’ve already passed on to most of them so it was great to see her. I’m sure she’d love to be here if she could.”

The surprise face-to-face meeting has been viewed as an “olive branch” by royal commentators after a turbulent two years following the couple’s decision to step down as senior royals in 2020.

The pair were absent from the Duke of Edinburgh’s memorial service in London last month.

Harry flew back from California, without Meghan who was heavily pregnant at the time, to attend his grandfather’s funeral in Windsor in April 2021 but his most recent return to the UK to unveil the statue of his late mother Diana, Princess of Wales on July 1 2021 with the Duke of Cambridge.

The duke and duchess moved to the US for a new life of personal and financial freedom.

But they later threw the monarchy into crisis with a controversial Oprah Winfrey television interview in which the couple accused an unnamed royal of racism against their son Archie before he was born and the institution of failing to help Meghan when she was suicidal.

Harry and Meghan’s unannounced return to the UK on Thursday also came amid concerns over the Queen’s health, with the monarch having recovered from Covid in February and experienced recent mobility issues.

Published: 19/04/2022 by Radio NewsHub