Tag: Windsor

Many Commonwealth countries want to dump the Queen

Barbados has announced it wants to replace the Queen with a ceremonial president in 2016. Other Commonwealth countries are considering a similar constitutional change

Barbados is getting rid of the Queen. For some reason, the prime minister, Freundel Stuart, feels that the country’s head of state should not be a foreign white woman who has the job because of a history of conquest, who is also head of state for 15 other countries, including most of their near neighbours, and who last visited Barbados in 1989.

Stuart promises to present a bill to remove her in time for next year’s 50th anniversary of Barbadian independence. If he does so, it is expected to pass.

To some extent it is easy to see why Britain keeps the Queen. She is British, after all. But what about Elizabeth II’s other queendoms? Might they be tempted to follow Barbados? Most Commonwealth countries have not kept the British monarch as head of state, and even those that have kept warm feelings may cool when Charles takes over.

The list of candidates is: Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, the Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, St Christopher and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu.

Among these, Jamaica could well be first to go republican, and should have beaten Barbados to it. The prime minster, Portia Simpson-Miller, vowed to do so before Jamaica’s own 50th anniversary of independence in 2012. The fact that she still hasn’t may be a sign that this kind of constitutional change is often more popular than practical.

In Canada, a poll in 2014 showed that, if there were to be a change in the constitution, the majority would prefer “a Canadian-born person chosen by Canadians” as head of state, although no such change looks imminent. Australia nearly embraced republicanism in a referendum in 1999, but 54.9% of those who voted chose otherwise.

But despite talk of crumbling and chilly palaces and of Queen Elizabeth also slipping down several “rich lists”, Britain’s monarchy will be wealthier than ever when she becomes its longest serving royal on the throne — 63 years — on Sept. 9.

A Reuters analysis of royal assets shows that the British monarchy has had a bumper few decades by benefiting from a rise in house and land prices.

According to a Reuters estimate based on the monarchy’s interests in its key investment vehicle, royal estates and its trove of treasures, the British monarchy has nominal assets worth about 22.8 billion pounds ($34.8 billion).

That would not get the British monarchy a spot in the top 10 global rich list headed by Bill Gates. But it would place the family in the top 20 globally, broadly comparable to the fortunes Forbes has estimated are controlled by Michael Bloomberg or Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

The Royal Collection, the monarchy’s centuries-old store of treasures, is valued at 10 billion pounds by Brand Finance, a consultancy which said it put the monarchy’s overall tangible assets at 20 billion pounds.

Both Reuters and Brand Finance’s estimates exclude the unknown value of splendid royal residences such as Buckingham Palace, Windsor and Balmoral.

Source: Guardian/Reuters

Buckingham braces for more Nazi-exposure

Buckingham Palace was last night braced for new embarrassment as turmoil continued over leaked footage showing the Queen performing a Nazi salute as a child.

An explosive Channel 4 documentary is set to reveal details of how Prince Philip’s sister met and admired Adolf Hitler, whom she described as a ‘charming and seemingly modest man’.

Three of his sisters were married to senior Nazi officers – one a colonel in the SS – and when Philip attended a family funeral in Germany in 1937 he was confronted by crowds giving the Heil Hitler salute. The documentary includes previously unseen extracts from a private memoir in which one sister talks of her early admiration for Hitler.

Meanwhile the footage showing the Queen performing a Nazi salute as a child could have been accidentally leaked by Buckingham Palace, it has been reported.

The Palace will not welcome a fresh focus on links to the Third Reich while controversy continues over the footage of the Queen.

The grainy film was shot in 1933, months after Hitler came to power and six years before the start of the Second World War. It shows the then seven-year-old Princess Elizabeth playing with a dog on the lawn at Balmoral with her sister Margaret, before raising her arm in a Nazi salute.

Her mother, the future Queen Mother, and her uncle Edward – later Edward VIII – are also shown in the pose. Her uncle appears to be showing them how to perform the Nazi salute, which even then was recognised internationally as a sign of obedience to Hitler.

Royal aides are investigating how the 17-second black and white film clip came to be published by The Sun, and Buckingham Palace has not ruled out legal action.

The footage was sold to a tabloid newspaper for a four-figure sum, the Mail has learnt.

Another remarkable photograph from 1937 shows Prince Philip, then just 16, in a funeral procession for his older sister Cecile, who was killed in an air crash.

The young prince is flanked by grieving relatives, all wearing distinctive Nazi uniforms. One is clad in the uniform of the Brownshirts; another wears full SS regalia.

The street in Darmstadt, near Frankfurt, is lined with crowds – many giving the ‘Heil Hitler’ salute.

On his marriage to Princess Elizabeth, he assumed his mother’s maternal surname – Mountbatten, which is an Anglicised version of the German ‘Battenberg’.

The Queen’s real surname is also is German – Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. That was the surname of Prince Albert, Queen Victoria’s husband, who was born near Coburg in Germany.

The Royal Family’s surname was changed to Windsor in 1917, during the First World War, when Saxe-Coburg-Gotha was considered too German a name – not least because the planes coming over to bomb Britain were called Gotha bombers.

Source: Daily Mail

Russians claim royal baby birth a fake

Kate Middleton could not have just given birth when she emerged from the Lindo Wing on Saturday, according to Russian media.

The Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda carried the claims which were made by various Russian women.

They said that it was “impossible” for the Duchess of Cambridge to look the way she did immediately after the birth, also questioning whether the baby was in fact born days before.

One woman said: “If she really gave birth naturally, it was surely some days ago.

Another added: “She gave birth three days ago. They reported it only now. Look at the baby – she does not look like a newborn at all.

“She is at least three days old. There is nothing which would help a woman, even if she gave birth with the help of best doctors, stand up five hours after giving birth – and leave the clinic on her feet.”

Others claimed that Kate Middleton had not given birth to the new princess herself.

One said: “It was a surrogate mother who gave birth but not her. Kate must have been wearing a fake belly showing to the people that she was pregnant.

“It is just not real to walk yourself several hours after birth and wave to the public in white dress.

“If you ever gave birth, try to recall yourself in three or four hours later.

“Even if the birth was easy, women just want to sleep and sleep for several hours. This is a fairy tale of a family of show offs.”

“She did not give birth, I am sure,” said one.

“There is no special maternal look in her eyes – this natural thing is not visible. Look at Diana. This Kate is just an actress from Buckingham Palace theatre. She never gave birth!.

Another said: “I thought this too – that the baby is at least 7-10 days old.

“First of all, she is too big for a newborn, and secondly, the face is smooth and pale.”

Actually, a few days earlier, on 28 April, or Tuesday night, a tweet announcing the birth of new baby “Princess Charlotte” was later denounced by Kensington Palace as a “fake”.

Despite no news having been announced of the Duchess of Cambridge going into labour, news organisations and well-wishers alike then leapt upon the “fake” news, adding more credibility to the Russian claims.

One news source even elaborated, saying: “Four days overdue with her second child, the Duchess of Cambridge was induced but fortunately the delivery was without complications.”

New DNA tests question Queen’s legitimacy

New DNA analysis of the remains of one of England’s most well-known monarchs, King Richard III, has led to fresh questions over the legitimacy of the present British Royal family, the House of Windsor.

“We question the legitimacy of the current Royal family. If they, the Royal heirs, are prepared to offer their DNA then ‘finality’ would be in order,” Craig Rex, who claims to be a 7th-generation descendant of another well-known English monarch, King George III, told Sputnik Thursday.

Historians remain split on the issue, but some researchers believe George Rex of Knysna in South Africa, was the legitimate first-born son of King George III of England. Now new speculation of a mismatch in the DNA of Richard III has reignited questions over the rightful inheritors of the throne of England.

“We do believe that there were strong ties between my ancestor George Rex of Knysna and the British Royal family at the time,” Rex said, adding that “There are contemporaneous documents, showing the Royal Family went hunting on the Rex estate during visits to South Africa. Why was there this strong connection when George Rex was the supposed son of a distiller?”

In a 1997 documentary, film maker Kenneth Griffith revealed “disturbing evidence” that George Rex was the “forgotten” legitimate son of King George III and should have become King of England. Griffith controversially claimed George III’s first marriage to quaker girl Hannah Lightfoot caused a scandal in the ruling establishment of the day, which was embarrassed about the King having married a commoner.

Second Child of British Royal Couple Expected in April
Griffith claimed the establishment then banished the legitimate off-spring to South Africa. But Griffith George III’s marriage to Lightfoot was never annulled and so, King George’s subsequent marriage to Charlotte Sophia of Mecklenburg-Strelitz in 1761 was illegitimate and so was the Royal status of all their subsequent heirs.

Royalist supporters maintain the documents Griffith produced were 19th century forgeries, aimed at discrediting the Monarchy, but despite descendants of George Rex willing to undertake DNA comparison testing the current Queen and her heirs remain unlikely to provide their own samples.

“Regarding DNA testing the current monarchy, I would welcome any scientific investigation that would reveal the facts that would stand up to peer review,” Trevor Rix, an administrator with a DNA comparison project, told Sputnik Thursday.

“Having said that, the current monarchy is very stable and has an enormous beneficial impact on the country both at home and abroad. I would therefore not want to see the boat rocked too much,” Rix added.

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Rix, who helps run the “Rix worldwide DNA project”, believes that the evidence he has gathered suggests George Rex of Knysna was not related to George III, but added more DNA comparison was needed before any final conclusions can be reached.

“Although we only have the one Y-DNA test on a Rex descendant of George Rex to go on, that single test matches test results of many descendants of Rix families whose ancestors predate George III,” Rix told Sputnik.

“So, as with the Richard III case, the DNA does not lie. Both cases illustrate that hearsay and descendancy on paper may well lie,” Rix added.

A study published this week in the Nature Communications journal, following DNA tests on the remains of Richard III, produced clear evidence of infidelity in the Royal family line.

Scientists remain uncertain when the break in linage may have occurred, but Dr Anna Whitelock of the University of London told the BBC that any break in the family tree would be unlikely to affect on the current status of the Queen.