A waving King Charles cut a carefree figure as he arrived for church on his Sandringham estate this Sunday. Yet it is a fair bet that the monarch was pondering a more sobering matter – his role as an unexpectedly prominent mover and shaker in Europe’s unfolding security crisis.
It is a testimony to the King’s prominence as an adjunct to this weekend’s high-octane diplomatic manoeuverings that after attending Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s summit of world leaders in London on Sunday, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky was due at the monarch’s Norfolk estate by helicopter for a personal audience.
The presence of Mr Zelensky at Sandringham – which like all royal encounters with heads of state was the result of the convention that invitations are extended by Buckingham Palace at the request of the British government – can be interpreted in a number of ways.
Some four days after Charles formed the regal spear tip of Sir Keir’s charm offensive on Donald Trump by writing the letter proferring to the American president an unprecedented second state visit to the UK, the invitation to Mr Zelensky is an essential reassertion of royal neutrality by ensuring that the Ukrainian leader gets his own fireside chat in Sandringham.
Sources were on Sunday at pains to play down any idea that the invitation to Mr Zelensky was a conspicuous show of royal support following his schismatic row with Trump and US vice-president JD Vance. Palace aides explained privately that the Sandringham meeting had been planned prior to Friday’s sulphurous Oval Office shouting match.
Nonetheless, the encounter – the third direct meeting between Charles and Mr Zelensky – will be an opportunity for the King to reaffirm his interest in the Ukraine war and his instinctive sympathy for the agonies being suffered by its citizens. Speaking on the second anniversary of the Russian invasion a year ago, the monarch paid tribute to the “determination and strength of the Ukrainian people”.
But perhaps most significant of all is the conspicuous deployment of the 76-year-old sovereign – after decades of Establishment warnings that the very integrity of the monarchy would be at stake if he did not stay out of politics – as an essential part of Britain’s toolkit to salvage the alliance between Europe and America at a time of unprecedented peril.
As one former senior Palace aide put it last night: “It is likely that the irony will not be lost on His Majesty that after being told for so long not to meddle and to stay quiet, he finds himself with a role to personally bind the wounds of the transatlantic relationship.”
The realpolitik of Mr Trump’s mercurial political proclivities and Washington’s apparent willingness to entertain Moscow’s resentments at Ukraine’s expense has forced Britain to deploy one of its few areas of leverage – the US President’s boundless admiration for the House of Windsor – hard and fast.
This week’s prize of the full pomp and circumstance of a second state visit – a privilege not accorded even to Ronald Reagan – came with the additional sweetener of a warm-up conflab in Scotland between the King and Mr Trump – either at the royal residences of Balmoral or Dumfries House – to plan arrangements.
Despite calls this weekend for both invitations to be withdrawn – or at the very least subjected to a drawn-out preparation phase until the acceptability of Washington’s intentions towards Ukraine and European security become clear – experts argue the King suddenly finds himself in a position of almost unique influence.
Ed Owens, a historian and writer on the nature of royal power, told The i Paper that the King’s audience with Mr Zelensky should be seen through a prism of cementing Britain’s newly minted role, along with France, as the intermediaries responsible for keeping Mr Trump vested in Ukraine and Europe.
Dr Owens said: “This audience emphasises the idea to Mr Trump that the state visit is with a King who is invested in the process and wants to see a satisfactory outcome where Ukraine are not simply abandoned.
“I think that Trump will be influenced by that because he has a lot of respect for the Royal Family, not necessarily as political decision makers but because he genuinely cares what people like the royals think about him.”
Buckingham Palace did not respond to a request to comment on the meeting with Mr Zelensky.
But the result is nonetheless a rare nexus between the soft power of the House of Windsor and the very hardest version of geopolitics which, according to some, King Charles may well be privately relishing.
Prior to his ascent to the throne, Charles had been careful to signal that his well-established tendency to lobby directly for the issues that moved him – from the fate of the planet to that of the patagonian tooth fish – would be curtailed once he became monarch. He once told an interviewer he would not be so “stupid” as to allow his reputation as a “meddler” to continue, saying: “I do realise that it is a separate exercise being sovereign. So of course I understand entirely how that should operate.”
The former aide said: “For all the previous criticism made of the King, he is emerging more and more as a monarch fit for our times. He is thoughtful, he is engaged and, in contrast to the late Queen, he is willing to express his views, albeit carefully and appropriately. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was quietly enjoying this.”
Indeed, it is pointed out that evidence for King Charles, almost despite himself, ushering in an era of an activist monarch is to be found precisely in the stark contrast between himself and his mother when it comes to expressing a political view.
Shortly after Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, royal watchers were pointed to the fact that Queen Elizabeth had been seen posing next to a bunch of yellow and blue flowers. Aides let it be known that the suggestion this was a subtle show of support for Ukraine would not be wide of the mark.
Times, it would seem, have changed. Dr Owens said: “Now we have Charles being used as shiny bait for the Trump magpie and the King himself being forthright on the issues. Charles is flexing his role here in ways that Elizabeth simply would not have.”
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