Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II made a surprise announcement on live TV that she intends to abdicate the throne on Jan. 14, capping off a 52-year reign to the day.
The 83-year-old queen announced her plan to pass the throne to her eldest son Crown Prince Frederik during her traditional New Year’s Eve speech.
Queen Margrethe II said she came to the decision after undergoing a successful operation on her back in February.
“The surgery naturally gave rise to thinking about the future — whether the time had come to leave the responsibility to the next generation,” she said, adding that time has taken its toll on her and her health.
“I have decided that now is the right time. On 14 January 2024 — 52 years after I succeeded my beloved father — I will step down as queen of Denmark.”
Queen Margrethe II succeeded her father upon his death on Jan 14, 1972. The Danish royal family does not hold formal coronation ceremonies.
The queen became the current longest-serving monarch in Europe following the death of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022. In July, she became the longest-sitting monarch in Denmark’s history.
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Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen extended a “heartfelt thank you to Her Majesty the Queen for her lifelong dedication and tireless efforts for the kingdom.”
“Although the duty and position of monarch has been handed down for more than 1,000 years, it is still difficult to understand that the time has now come for a change of throne,” Frederiksen stated.
“Many of us have never known another monarch. Queen Margrethe is the epitome of Denmark and throughout the years has put words and feelings into who we are as a people and as a nation.”
The six-foot (1.82 m), chain-smoking Margrethe has been one of the most popular public figures in Denmark, where the monarch’s role is largely ceremonial. She often walked the streets of Copenhagen virtually unescorted and won the admiration of Danes for her warm manners and for her talents as a linguist and designer.
A keen skier, she was a member of a Danish women’s air force unit as a princess, taking part in judo courses and endurance tests in the snow. Margrethe remained tough even as she grew older. In 2011, at age 70, she visited Danish troops in southern Afghanistan wearing a military jumpsuit.
As monarch, she crisscrossed the country and regularly visited Greenland and the Faroe Islands, the two semi-independent territories which are part of the Danish Realm, and was met everywhere by cheering crowds.
Denmark has Europe’s oldest ruling monarchy, which traces its line back to the Viking king Gorm the Old, who died in 958. Although Margrethe is head of state, the Danish Constitution strictly rules out her involvement in party politics.
Born in 1940 to Denmark’s former monarch King Frederik IX and Queen Ingrid, Margrethe became heir to her father in 1953 at the age of 13, after a constitutional amendment allowed women to inherit the throne.
In 1967, she married French diplomat Henri de Laborde de Monpezat, who served as her royal consort until his death in 2018.
The couple’s two sons are Crown Prince Frederik, who will become King Frederik X, and Prince Joachim.
Frederik married Mary Elizabeth Donaldson, an Australian, in 2004. Crown Princess Mary will become queen when her husband ascends.
— With files from the Associated Press and Reuters
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