Royal news live: King Charles accepts ‘painful aspects of our past’ as he bids farewell to Samoa
The monarch acknowledged the need to ‘right inequalites that endure’ in landmark speech
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King Charles acknowledged the “most painful aspects” of the Commonwealth’s past as he bid goodbye to Samoa after indirectly acknowledging growing calls for slavery reprations in Samoa.
Charles and Queen Camilla ended their four-day state visit to Samoa by visiting a village twinned with the UK after attending a major Commonwealth summit was hosted by the Pacific nation.
In his landmark speech at the opening of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) on Friday, the monarch acknowledged the need to “acknowledge where we have come from”.
He told world leaders at the summit: “None of us can change the past. But we can commit, with all our hearts to learning its lessons and to finding creative ways to right inequalities that endure.”
But Charles stopped short of mentioning financial reparations that some leaders at the event urged for and instead exhorted them to find the “right language” and an understanding of history “to guide us towards making the right choices in future where inequality exists”.
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King Charles warns against threat of climate crisis
King Charles has warned Commonwealth leaders against the “existential” threat of climate change, encouraging all 56 members to do everything possible to cut emissions.
He told the summit that humanity needed to “forge a future of harmony with nature and between ourselves” and that climate concerns have been raised with him over and over again.
“This year alone we have seen terrifying storms in the Caribbean, devastating flooding in East Africa and catastrophic wildfires in Canada,” he told the leaders at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) in Samoa.
“I can only offer every encouragement for action with unequivocal determination to arrest rising temperatures by cutting emissions, building resilience as far as possible to both the current and forecast impacts of climate change, and conserving and restoring nature both on land and in the sea.”
Indigenous Australian senator intensifies criticism of King Charles III
An Indigenous senator has intensified her criticism of King Charles, again accusing the British monarch of complicity in the “genocide” against Australia’s First Nations peoples and declaring on Wednesday she will not be “shut down.”
Sen. Lidia Thorpe’s comments followed an encounter with the monarch at a parliamentary reception Monday where she was escorted out after shouting at him for British colonizers taking Indigenous land and bones.
Despite facing political and public backlash, Thorpe was resolute in a television interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and said she would continue to press for justice.
Read the full report:
Indigenous Australian senator intensifies criticism of King Charles III
An Indigenous senator has intensified her criticism of King Charles III, again accusing the British monarch of complicity in the “genocide” against Australia’s First Peoples and declaring she will not be “shut down.”
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