Prince Charles is rejecting claims he was the royal family member who made remarks about the complexion of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s future children.
A new book, Brothers And Wives: Inside The Private Lives of William, Kate, Harry and Meghan, by Christopher Andersen, alleges it was the Prince of Wales who questioned what skin colour Meghan Markle and Prince Harry‘s future children would have.
Andersen, a U.S. journalist and former editor of People magazine, claims the comments came on the day that Harry and Markle’s engagement was announced, in November 2017.
“I wonder what the children will look like?” Andersen writes, identifying Prince Charles as the speaker.
“Well, absolutely gorgeous, I’m certain,” the book claims his wife, Camilla, said. The alleged response was: “I mean, what do you think their children’s complexion might be?”
On Monday, a spokesperson from Charles’ office dismissed the allegation as “fiction.”
“This is fiction and not worth further comment,” the Clarence House spokesman told reporters in Barbados, where Charles is to take part in celebrations marking the island’s move to becoming a republic.
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The book, which comes out this week, stops short of identifying Charles as the “senior royal” accused by Markle of raising concern over the skin colour of her first son, Archie. She made the comment during her March interview with Oprah Winfrey.
In an interview on Today on Monday, Andersen further elaborated on his book’s claims, saying that Charles’ comments were “benign” and palace insiders twisted the narrative.
“On the morning that Meghan and Harry’s engagement was announced, in a very kind of benign way, Prince Charles started to muse on what their future grandchildren might look like,” Andersen said on Today.
“I mean, here’s this beautiful biracial American woman and the world’s most famous redhead. I’m a grandfather, of course, we all do this, speculate on it. But it was turned into something very toxic, it was weaponized by the ‘Men in Gray’ who run the palace organization. Unfortunately, by the time it got to Harry, that’s the way he took it,” he said.
Markle told a stunned Winfrey that her son Archie was denied the title of prince because of concerns in the family over how dark his skin would be.
Winfrey pressed Harry on the issue later in the interview, and Harry said it was not a comment made by either of his grandparents, Queen Elizabeth or Prince Philip.
“That conversation I’m never going to share. It was awkward. I was a bit shocked,” he said at the time.
Buckingham Palace issued a statement after the Oprah interview, saying they would address Markle’s allegations privately as a family, but assured the public they take issues concerning race very seriously.
In the days following the Winfrey interview, Prince William told a reporter, “We are very much not a racist family.”
However, last week, Prince William came under fire for comments he made about Africa and its population growth that were seen by many as racist and privileged.
– With a file from Reuters
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