BRITAIN’S KING CHARLES ARRIVES IN GERMANY FOR FIRST STATE VISIT
▶ Monarch and Queen Consort Camilla are greeted with 21-gun salute at ceremony in Berlin
Britain’s King Charles III began the first state visit of his reign yesterday as he was greeted with pomp and ceremony in Germany.
The king and Queen Consort Camilla were given a 21-gun salute after they arrived in Berlin.
The royal couple greeted crowds at the Brandenburg Gate after inspecting a military guard of honour.
They stood for the national anthems with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who was later to host them for a state banquet.
In a statement in English and German, the king and queen consort said it was a “great joy” to be able to develop the “longstanding friendship between our two nations”.
The visit is meant to symbolise a turning point in UK-German relations after Brexit.
A royal stop in France was postponed because of mass protests against President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms.
The king’s environmental activism is also at the heart of the visit.
Yesterday, he met German Green party ministers and energy bosses on the sidelines of a climate forum in Berlin.
“King Charles began to champion healthy nutrition, sustainability and climate action very early on,” Mr Steinmeier said. “We are all benefiting from your majesty’s convictions.”
Dr Sultan Al Jaber, UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, and Cop28 President-designate, earlier told the forum that the world had a “small window to make a massive course correction” to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. At Berlin Brandenburg Airport, a fly-past by two fighter jets greeted the royal couple as they disembarked from the Voyager ministerial plane.
Two Typhoon jets escorted the plane carrying the couple, their entourage and members of the media.
The UK and Germany’s respective ambassadors met the king at the airport before a motorcade took him into the city.
Crowds waited for hours at the Brandenburg Gate, where a Union flag was flying alongside the German flag. The ceremony at the gate – which once divided East and West Berlin and is now a symbol of the reunited Germany – was an unusual honour for a foreign dignitary.
“Ahead of our first state visit to Germany, we are very much looking forward to meeting all of those who make this country so special,” the king and his wife said in a statement.
“It is a great joy to be able to continue the deepening of the longstanding friendship between our two nations.” The visit comes after the signing of the Windsor Framework Brexit deal was hailed as a new beginning after years of UK-EU acrimony.
The state visit was requested by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government, with the French leg set to be rescheduled. The monarchy is seen as a soft diplomatic tool for the UK to build bridges abroad.
Britain’s royals have long ancestral ties to Germany, where they remain a subject of popular interest. King Charles made 28 official trips to Germany as Prince of Wales, most recently in 2020 when he addressed parliament in Berlin.
He is expected to do so again today, when he will also meet Chancellor Olaf Scholz, speak to refugees who have recently arrived from Ukraine, and visit an organic farm.
He will travel to Hamburg on the final day of his trip, where he will tour a renewable energy project and commemorate victims of Allied bombing in 1943.