Summary
- Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are set to return to the UK in mid July with their children, Archie and Lilibet, marking the first time the couple’s children will visit the country together.
- Speculation around the visit has grown louder following recent reports that Prince William may be open to meeting his brother for the first time since the release of Harry’s memoir, Spare.
- The visit comes against the backdrop of a long running rift between the Sussexes and the royal family, one that deepened significantly following their 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, the Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan, and the publication of Spare, in which Harry made a series of personal disclosures about senior royals including Queen Camilla, Prince William and Princess Kate.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are set to return to the UK in mid July with their children, Archie and Lilibet, marking the first time the couple’s children will visit the country together. The trip is tied to the countdown ceremony for the Invictus Games 2027, the multi sport event for injured and ill military veterans that Harry founded in 2014, which will be hosted in Birmingham.
The couple left the UK in 2020 after stepping down from royal duties and have made only one joint visit since, attending Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral in 2022. Archie was seven months old at the time and did not travel with them. Reports suggest the couple has been offered a royal residence for their stay this summer, though they have not yet responded to the offer.
Speculation around the visit has grown louder following recent reports that Prince William may be open to meeting his brother for the first time since the release of Harry’s memoir, Spare. Amid that speculation, an unnamed source cited by the Daily Mail offered a far less generous interpretation of the trip’s purpose, suggesting it was designed to put pressure on the royal family rather than mend ties. According to the source, bringing the children along puts the Palace in a difficult position, since declining to meet them could be framed publicly as the family being ignored despite reaching out.
The same source claimed the underlying motive was to push the Palace into providing security for the children, arguing that anything less would be characterised as leaving them unprotected. The source described this as a particularly aggressive tactic, predicting it would not be received well.
It is worth noting that these claims come from a single anonymous source and have not been confirmed by Harry, Meghan, or Buckingham Palace.
The visit comes against the backdrop of a long running rift between the Sussexes and the royal family, one that deepened significantly following their 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, the Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan, and the publication of Spare, in which Harry made a series of personal disclosures about senior royals including Queen Camilla, Prince William and Princess Kate.
Whether the upcoming visit leads to genuine reconciliation or further strains an already difficult relationship remains to be seen, with much likely to depend on what, if anything, actually takes place once the family arrives in the UK next month.
