Prince Harry accuses ‘certain’ Royal Family members of ‘getting in bed with the devil’ as TV interview airs
Prince Harry has accused members of the Royal Family of getting in “bed with the devil” over their links with the tabloid press – and admitted Meghan did not get on with William and Kate “from the get-go”.
In an interview with ITV, the Duke of Sussex insisted he did not have “any intention to harm” or “hurt” his brother or King Charles with his memoir Spare, which includes a series of explosive allegations.
He also denied that accusations of racism were made towards the royals when he and Meghan were interviewed by US TV host Oprah Winfrey.
In the wide-ranging interview with presenter Tom Bradby, Harry said it was “important to acknowledge” his past drug use after he admitted in his book taking cocaine, cannabis and magic mushrooms.
He also claimed there was a “horrible reaction” from his family members on the day that Queen Elizabeth died, with “briefings”, “leaking” and “planting”.
Addressing the “relationship between certain members of the family and the tabloid press”, Harry said: “Those certain members have decided to get in the bed with the devil, right? – to rehabilitate their image.
“If you need to do that, or you want to do that, you choose to do that – well, that is a choice. That’s up to you.
“But the moment that that rehabilitation comes at the detriment of others – me, other members of my family – then that’s where I draw the line.”
Harry accused of being ‘scathing’ about Camilla
Bradby suggested to Harry that he was “pretty consistently scathing” in his memoir about his “stepmother and the press”.
An excerpt read by Harry from his book said he and William “endorse Camilla” but they asked their father Charles not to marry her.
“Shortly after our private summits with her, she began to play the long game,” Harry writes.
“A campaign aimed at marriage, and eventually the Crown, with Pa’s blessing we presumed.
“Stories began to appear everywhere in all the papers about her private conversation with Willie, stories that contained pinpoint accurate details, none of which had come from Willie, of course. They could only have been leaked by the other one other person present.”
Read more:
Harry cuts a sad, self-indulgent and naive figure in his memoir
In his ITV interview, Harry denied being “scathing towards any member of my family, especially not my stepmother”.
The duke said he wanted “reconciliation” with his family but “there needs to be some accountability”.
He told Bradby: “I think there’s probably a lot of people who, after watching the documentary and reading the book, will go: ‘How could you ever forgive your family for what they’ve done?’ People have already said that to me.
“I said, forgiveness is 100% a possibility because I would like to get my father back. I would like to have my brother back.
“At the moment, I don’t recognise them, as much as they probably don’t recognise me.”
William and Kate didn’t get on with Meghan ‘from the get-go’
Discussing Kate and William’s relationship with Meghan, Harry said the couple were “Suits fans” but there had been “a lot of stereotyping” over her being an “American actress, divorced, biracial”.
Bradby said the impression was that the Prince and Princess of Wales “almost from the get-go” did not “get on” with Meghan.
“Fair?” the presenter asked.
“Yeah, fair,” Harry replied.
The prince said his brother “never tried to dissuade” him from marrying Meghan but he “aired some concerns very early” and claimed William told him: “This is going to be really hard for you”.
“Maybe he predicted what the British press’s reaction was going to be,” Harry added.
Harry addresses alleged physical attack by William
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Prince Harry: ‘I saw red mist in William’
In his book, Harry claims he was physically attacked by William during a row over his marriage to Meghan.
He told ITV that he and his brother “used to fight all the time” as younger siblings but there was a different “level of frustration” in the alleged incident.
“I saw this red mist in him,” Harry said.
“I can pretty much guarantee today that if I wasn’t doing therapy sessions like I was, and being able to process that anger and frustration, that I would’ve fought back – 100%.”
Harry said he did not think his brother and father would read his book but added: “I really hope they do.”
Bradby suggested that Harry had “not so much burnt your bridges” with the Royal Family but “taken a flame-thrower to them”.
“Well they’ve shown absolutely no willingness to reconcile up until this point”, Harry replied.
“And I’m not sure how honesty is burning bridges. You know, silence only allows the abuser to abuse, right? So I don’t know how staying silent is ever going to make things better.”
Pic: AP
Charles warned Harry he faced ‘suicide mission’ over press
On his bid to take on the tabloids, Harry said his father warned him it was “probably a suicide mission to try and change” the press.
The duke claimed there was a “distorted narrative” that he and Meghan “wanted to leave to go and make money” when they departed as working royals.
He said the couple decided to put their “mental health first” and asked for “help and support”.
“At that time, I didn’t fully understand how much – or how complicit the family were in that pain and suffering that was happening to my wife,” Harry added.
“The one group of people that could’ve helped or stopped this from happening were the very people that were – that were encouraging it to happen.”
Harry criticises ‘horrific’ Jeremy Clarkson article about Meghan
Pic: AP
Harry branded Jeremy Clarkson’s recent article about Meghan as “horrific”, “hurtful” and “cruel”.
Clarkson was widely criticised for his column, published in The Sun newspaper, which said he was “dreaming of the day when (Meghan) is made to parade naked through the streets of every town in Britain while crowds chant, ‘Shame!’ and throw lumps of excrement at her”.
Harry told ITV: “What he said was horrific and is hurtful and cruel towards my wife, but it also encourages other people around the UK and around the world, men particularly, to go and think that it’s acceptable to treat women that way.”
Harry said “the world” was asking for “some form of comment from the monarchy” but “the silence is deafening, to put it mildly”.
“Everything to do with my wife, after six years, they haven’t said a single thing,” he added. “But they’re willing to defend themselves regularly.”
Harry denies Royal Family were accused of racism in Oprah interview
Pic: CBS
Asked about his interview with Winfrey in June 2021, Harry said his wife’s claims that a family member made “troubling” comments about the skin colour of his son, Archie, related to “unconscious bias” not racism.
The duke also said the recent incident at Buckingham Palace involving black campaigner Ngozi Fulani and Lady Susan Hussey, the late Queen’s lady in waiting, “is a very good example of the environment within the institution”.
After Bradby suggested to Harry that “in the Oprah interview you accused members of your family of racism”, the duke responded by saying “no I didn’t” and added “the British press said that”.
“Did Meghan ever mention that they’re racist?,” Harry asked.
After Bradby said the duchess claimed troubling comments were made about Archie’s skin colour, Harry said: “There was – there was concern about his skin colour.”
Asked if he would describe that as racist, the duke said: “I wouldn’t, not having lived within that family.”
He continued: “The difference between racism and unconscious bias, the two things are different.”
Harry’s happiness ‘infuriates’ some people
Now living in California, Harry said he was “very happy” and “in a better place than I’ve ever been”.
“I think that probably angers some people, infuriates others, because just by the nature of me leaving,”he added.
“I’m sure… some people always thought that Meghan would leave right, but I don’t think they ever thought that I would leave as well.”
Harry’s book is due to be released on Tuesday but Sky News obtained a copy after it was accidentally put out for sale early in Spain.
Hip hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs has lost a bid to delay his upcoming sex-trafficking trial by two months.
US district judge Arun Subramanian said the 55-year-old rapper made his request too close to his trial, which is due to start next month.
Jury selection is currently scheduled for 5 May with opening statements set to be heard seven days later.
Combs has pleaded not guilty to five criminal counts including racketeering and sex trafficking.
Prosecutors with the Manhattan US attorney’s office accuse Combs of using his business empire to sexually abuse women between 2004 and 2024.
Combs’s lawyers say the sexual activity described by prosecutors was consensual.
In a court filing on Wednesday, Combs’s lawyer Marc Agnifilo asked Mr Subramanian to delay the trial because he needed more time to prepare his defence to two new charges which were brought on 4 April.
The charges were of sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution.
Mr Agnifilo also said his team needs extra time to review emails it wants an alleged victim to turn over.
The new allegations brought the total number of criminal charges against the rap mogul to five – following the three original counts, which also included racketeering conspiracy, filed in September.
Federal prosecutors were opposed to any delay, writing in a Thursday court filing that the additional charges brought
earlier this month did not amount to substantially new conduct.
They also said Combs was not entitled to the alleged victim’s communications.
Read more: Everything you need to know about the Sean Combs trial
A sketch of Combs during one of his court appearances. Pic: Reuters
Meanwhile, Mr Subramanian is weighing other evidentiary issues, such as whether to allow alleged victims to testify under pseudonyms.
Also known during his career as Puff Daddy and P Diddy, Combs founded Bad Boy Records and is credited with helping turn rappers and R&B singers such as Notorious B.I.G, Mary J. Blige, Faith Evans and Usher into stars in the 1990s and 2000s.
But prosecutors have said his success concealed a dark side.
They say his alleged abuse included having women take part in recorded sexual performances called “freak-offs” with male sex workers, who were sometimes transported across state lines.
Combs has been in jail in Brooklyn since September, having been denied bail.
He also faces dozens of civil lawsuits by women and men who have accused him of sexual abuse.
Combs has strenuously denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
Entertainment
Warfare’s Alex Garland: ‘Being anti-war is not the same as saying it should never happen’
Alex Garland says while it’s “the most obvious statement about life on this planet” that the world would be a better place without war, it “doesn’t mean it should never happen”, and there are “circumstances in which war is required”.
The Oscar-nominated screenwriter and director told Sky News: “I don’t think it is possible to make a statement about what war is really like without it being implicitly anti-war, inasmuch as it would be better if this thing did not happen.
“But that’s not the same as saying it should never happen. There are circumstances in which war is required.”
(L-R) Co-writers and co-directors Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza. Pic: A24
His latest film, Warfare, embeds the audience within a platoon of American Navy SEALs on an Iraqi surveillance mission gone wrong, telling the story solely through the memories of war veterans from a real 2006 mission in Ramadi, Iraq.
Garland says the film is “anti-war in as much as it is better if war does not happen,” adding, “and that is about the most obvious statement about life on this planet that one could make.”
Comparing it to ongoing geopolitical conflict across the world, Garland goes on: “It would be better if Gaza had not been flattened. It would be better if Ukraine was not invaded. It would it better if all people’s problems could be solved via dialogue and not threat or violence…
“To be anti-war to me is a rational position, and most veterans I’ve met are anti-war.”
The screenwriter behind hits including Ex Machina, 28 Days Later and The Beach says this film is “an attempt to recreate something as faithfully and accurately as we could”.
The film opens to Swedish dance hit Call On Me. Pic: A24
‘War veterans feel invisible and forgotten’
Almost entirely based on first-person accounts, the 15-rated film opens with soldiers singing along to the video of Swedish dance hit Call On Me – complete with gyrating women in thong leotards.
It’s the only music in the film. The remaining score is made up of explosions, sniper fire and screams of pain.
Garland co-wrote and co-directed the film alongside Hollywood stuntman and gunfight coordinator Ray Mendoza, whom Garland met on his last film, Civil War.
Mendoza, a communications officer on the fateful mission portrayed in the film, says despite the traumatic content, the experience of making the film was “therapeutic”.
Mendoza told Sky News: “It actually mended a lot of relationships… There were some guys I hadn’t spoken to in a very long time. And this allowed us to bury the hatchet, so to speak, on some issues from that day.”
Turning to Hollywood after serving in the Navy for 16 years, Mendoza says past war film he’d seen – even the good ones – were “a little off” because they “don’t get the culture right”.
Mendoza admits: “You feel like no one cares because they didn’t get it right. You feel invisible. You feel forgotten.”
With screenings of Warfare shown to around 1,000 veterans ahead of general release, Mendoza says: “They finally feel heard. They finally feel like somebody got it right.”
As to whether it could be triggering for some veterans, Mendoza says decisively not: “It’s not triggering. I would say it’s the opposite, for a veteran at least.”
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D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai plays communications officer Ray. Pic: A24
‘I’m an actor – I love my hair’
A tense and raw 90-minute story told in real time, the film’s ensemble cast is made up of young buzzy actors, dubbed “all of the internet’s boyfriends” when the casting was first announced.
Mirroring the Navy SEALs they were portraying, the cast initially bonded through a three-week bootcamp ahead of filming, before living together for the 25-day shoot.
Black Mirror’s Will Poulter, who plays Eric, the officer in charge of the operation, says the film’s extended takes and 360-degree sets demanded a special kind of focus.
Poulter said: “It required everyone to practise something that is fundamental to Navy SEAL mentality – you’re a teammate before you’re an individual.
“When a camera’s roaming around like that and could capture anyone at kind of any moment, it requires that everyone to be ‘on’ at all times and for the sake of each other.
“It becomes less about making sure that you’re performing when the camera lands on you, but as much about this idea that you are performing for the sake of the actor opposite you when the camera’s on them.”
Another of the film’s stars, Reservation Dogs’ D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, plays Mendoza and is the heart of the film.
Woon-A-Tai says the cast drew on tactics used by real soldiers to help with the intense filming schedule: “Laughter is medicine… A lot of times these are long takes, long hours, back-to-back days, so uplifting our spirit was definitely a big part of it.”
He also joked that shaving each other’s heads in a bonding ritual the night before the first day of filming was a daunting task.
“As actors, we love our hair. I mean, I speak personally, I love my hair. You know, I had really long hair. So yeah, it definitely takes a lot of trust. And you know, it wasn’t even at all, but you know it was still fun to do.”
Warfare is in cinemas now.
Birmingham band UB40 say the city’s striking bin workers and their union should “keep fighting” in their dispute over pay.
It comes as the government and the council urged them to accept a “fair and reasonable offer”.
“We’re fully on their side,” drummer Jimmy Brown told Sky News. “I think they shouldn’t give up, they should still be fighting.
“Working people shouldn’t have to take a reduction in their incomes, which is what we’re talking about here.
“We’re talking about people being paid less and it seems to me with prices going up, heating, buying food, inflation and rents going up then people need a decent wage to have a half decent life… keep going boys!”
Members of the Unite union in Birmingham earlier this month. Pic: PA
Workers joined picket lines again on Thursday, with some fearing they could be up to £600 a month worse off if they accept the terms.
“We have total utter support for the bin men and all trade unions,” said guitarist Robin Campbell.
“The other side is always going to say they’ve made a reasonable offer – the point is they’re the ones who’ve messed up, they’re the ones who’ve gone bankrupt, they’re the ones now trying to reduce the bin men’s wages.”
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Lead singer Matt Doyle told Sky News: “It’s a shame that what we’re seeing is all the images of rats and rubbish building up, that is going to happen inevitably, but we’ve just got to keep fighting through that.”
About 22,000 tonnes of rubbish accumulated on the city’s streets after a major incident was declared last month by Birmingham City Council.
Rubbish has blighted the city’s streets for weeks . Pic: PA
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Bin situation ‘pains me’ – council boss
On a visit to the city, local government minister Jim McMahon said the union and local authority should continue to meet in “good faith” and the government felt there was a deal that could be “marshalled around”.
He paid tribute to the “hundreds of workers” who have worked “around the clock” to clear the rubbish.
Read more:
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“As we stand here today, 85% of that accumulated waste has been cleared and the council have a plan in place now to make sure it doesn’t accumulate going forward,” said Mr McMahon.
Sky News understands talks are not set to resume until next week.
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