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Harry's racism 'olive branch' dismissed in UK as book comes out

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Anna Malpas and Jitendra Joshi, Agence France-Presse

<div class="embed-wrap"><figure data-feedback="fb:likes,fb:comments"><img alt="(L-R) Britain" s="" Princess="" of="" Prince="" Duke="" and="" Duchess="" Sussex="" on="" the="" long="" Walk="" at="" Windsor="" Castle="" Sept.="" before="" meeting="" well-wishers.="" Kirsty="" Pool="" AFP="" src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2023/afp/01/04/20220910-queen-elizabeth-wiliam-harry-afp-1.jpg"/><figcaption>(L-R) Britain&#x27;s Catherine, Princess of Wales, Britain&#x27;s Prince William, Prince of Wales, Britain&#x27;s Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex on the long Walk at Windsor Castle on Sept. 10, 2022, before meeting well-wishers. Kirsty O&#x27;Connor, Pool/AFP/File</figcaption></figure></div>LONDON — Prince Harry&#x27;s denial that he accused his family of racism was interpreted in the UK press Monday as a bizarre peace offering, but commentators argued the damage had already been done as his unflinching memoir comes out.The midnight release of &quot;Spare&quot; is being accompanied by four television interviews in Britain and the United States, where Harry now lives with wife Meghan.In the first to air, with Britain&#x27;s ITV, the Duke of Sussex caused bafflement by insisting he and his mixed-race wife never accused the royal family of racism over comments made about the skin tone of their unborn son.&quot;No I didn&#x27;t. The British press said that,&quot; Harry said, adding that Meghan had also not called the royals &quot;racist&quot;.The initial allegation, made in a bombshell interview given by Harry and Meghan in March 2021 to US chat show host Oprah Winfrey, caused a transatlantic uproar.Harry&#x27;s elder brother and the heir to King Charles III&#x27;s throne, Prince William, told reporters at the time that &quot;we are very much not a racist family&quot;, but Harry himself stayed silent then.The late Queen Elizabeth II, the mens&#x27; grandmother, said then that &quot;recollections may vary&quot; about what was said -- a line that was repeated by some UK commentators in mocking response to Harry&#x27;s interviews.<ul class="op-related-articles">	<li><a href="https://news.abs-cbn.com/life/01/09/23/prince-harry-says-memoirs-written-to-combat-spin-and-distortion">Prince Harry says memoirs written to combat &#x27;spin and distortion&#x27;</a></li></ul>Several described his denial to ITV as an &quot;olive branch&quot;, but one that was contradicted by the Oprah interview and coming too late, given the incendiary nature of his other allegations in the book.The British public is not impressed, a YouGov poll indicated Monday, finding that 64 percent have a negative view of Harry and that Meghan also scores dismally.And after days of TV trailers and newspaper leaks, a relatively low figure of 4.1 million people tuned into the ITV interview, according to official ratings data.<div>&#x27;Probably bigoted&#x27;</div>Accusing the press of effectively killing his mother Princess Diana, Harry used another interview with US network CBS to take aim also at his father&#x27;s second wife, Camilla.The queen consort waged a cunning but &quot;dangerous&quot; campaign to win over the press herself, he said, calling her &quot;the villain&quot;.The book includes a claim that William physically attacked Harry as they argued about Meghan.It also gives an account of how he lost his virginity, an admission of teenaged drug use and a claim he killed 25 people while serving in Afghanistan with the British military.<ul class="op-related-articles">	<li><a href="https://news.abs-cbn.com/overseas/01/06/23/prince-harry-says-he-killed-25-in-afghanistan-media">Prince Harry says he killed 25 in Afghanistan: media</a></li></ul>To ITV, Harry also defended a long-serving royal courtier, Susan Hussey, after she grilled a black British guest at a palace reception about where the woman &quot;really&quot; came from.But to CBS, the prince also admitted to being &quot;probably bigoted&quot; before he met Meghan, and accused William and his wife Kate of never giving her a chance.The Sun newspaper said Harry had &quot;astonished&quot; viewers with his racism &quot;U-turn&quot;, and described the 38-year-old prince as a &quot;troubled, lonely man&quot;.&quot;Nothing is Harry&#x27;s fault and almost everything can be blamed on the press,&quot; the Daily Telegraph wrote.&quot;Some of it made no sense: Meghan and Harry are fans of Lady Hussey and think it was the press that accused her of being racist? &quot;The press made up the accusations that the royal family was racist, when the couple were making a very different allegation about &#x27;unconscious bias&#x27;?&quot; The left-leaning Guardian wrote: &quot;If she had lived to see this, it wouldn&#x27;t have killed the queen. But it might have made her a republican.&quot;<div>Public retreat?</div>The contents of Harry&#x27;s ghost-written book have already been widely leaked after it went on sale early in Spain.He insisted to ITV that he still wanted a rapprochement with his father and brother, but said the onus was on them, refusing to confirm whether he will attend Charles&#x27;s coronation in May.He also urged his family to respond. &quot;Silence only allows the abuser to abuse, right? So I don&#x27;t know how staying silent is ever gonna make things better,&quot; he added.In the CBS interview, Harry said that he and William were not currently speaking and he had not talked to his father &quot;for quite a while&quot;.Omid Scobie, a friend and biographer of Harry and Meghan, said the couple were likely now to adopt a lower profile after the recent &quot;soap opera&quot;.&quot;I think we&#x27;re going to see, for the rest of this year, a couple sort of retreating from a lot of what we&#x27;ve seen over the last few months,&quot; he told BBC radio.<div>© Agence France-Presse</div>

Prince Harry's denial that he accused his family of racism was interpreted in the UK press Monday as a bizarre peace offering, but commentators argued the damage had already been done as his unflinching memoir comes out.

Harry's racism 'olive branch' dismissed in UK as book comes out

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Harry's racism 'olive branch' dismissed in UK as book comes out

Anna Malpas and Jitendra Joshi,

Agence France-Presse

Published January 09, 2023 11:56 PM PHT

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Updated January 10, 2023 08:04 AM PHT

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Britain

US

royals

Prince Harry

Prince William

Meghan Markle

Princess Diana

Camilla Parker Bowles

King Charles

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