Buckingham Palace Considering Legal Action after Royal Race Row Leak The Hollywood Reporter
Buckingham Palace says it is “exploring all options,” including possible legal proceedings, following a publishing error that led to the naming of the two royals alleged to have discussed the skin color of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle‘s son, Archie.
A palace spokesperson made the comments to the BBC on Friday in the wake of the revelations, which named King Charles and Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, as the senior royals who allegedly had “conversations” with Prince Harry about his and Markle’s then-unborn baby.
The alleged discussions about the baby’s skin color first came up in the high-profile interview the royal couple did with Oprah Winfrey in March 2021.
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King Charles and the Princess of Wales were named in a Dutch version of Omid Scobie’s book Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy’s Fight for Survival. Scobie repeated the allegations in the original English version of his book but did not name names.
In an interview with the BBC on Thursday night, Scobie said he did not know how the Dutch translation of the book came to include the names and that a “full investigation” was being carried out to find out the cause of the error. Speaking to commercial network ITV, Scobie insisted he had “never submitted a book that had their names in it,” and also claimed other British journalists had “known those names for a long time” but did not publish them. The U.K. has very strict libel laws and the allegations could be deemed defamation if a court found that it was the equivalent of calling the offending royals racist.
The Dutch version of Endgame that includes the names has been pulled and pulped. A new version, with the names expunged, will come out in The Netherlands on Friday.
Dutch royal reporter Rick Evers was the first to publicize the relevant passages, posting a video, in English, showing the relevant sections in the Dutch version of the book.
King Charles and the Princess of Wales were quickly named in reports from non-U.K. media but the press in the U.K., which has strict libel laws, initially held back until Piers Morgan reported the names on his TalkTV show. Other British outlets followed suit, including the BBC.
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