The chair of the charity set up by Prince Harry has accused him of “harassment and bullying at scale” after he and several others quit the organisation earlier this week.

The Duke of Sussex was said to have initiated the campaign by the “unleashing of the Sussex [PR] machine”.

Sentebale chair Dr Sophie Chandauka told Trevor Phillips on Sky’s Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips: “The only reason I’m here… is because at some point on Tuesday, Prince Harry authorised the release of a damaging piece of news to the outside world without informing me or my country directors, or my executive director.

“And can you imagine what that attack has done for me, on me and the 540 individuals in the Sentebale organisations and their family?

“That is an example of harassment and bullying at scale.”

Sky News contacted the Duke and Duchess of Sussex about the contents of the interview and they declined to offer any formal response.

A source close to the former trustees of the Sentebale charity has described as “completely baseless” Dr Chandauka’s claims that she was bullied and harassed, briefed against by Prince Harry, or that the Sussex machine was unleashed on her.

On Tuesday, Prince Harry quit as patron of the charity, which he set up in honour of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales.

At the time, he released a joint statement with co-founder Prince Seeiso of Lesotho, saying they had been forced to step down “in support of and solidarity with” the board of trustees who had also resigned, following their disagreements with the chairwoman.

They wrote that the relationship “broke down beyond repair, creating an untenable situation”.

The problems reportedly stem from a decision to focus fundraising in Africa.

In a statement earlier this week, seemingly targeted at Prince Harry, Dr Chandauka said: “There are people in this world who behave as though they are above the law and mistreat people, and then play the victim card and use the very press they disdain to harm people who have the courage to challenge their conduct.

“Beneath all the victim narrative and fiction that has been syndicated to the press is the story of a woman who dared to blow the whistle about issues of poor governance, weak executive management, abuse of power, bullying, harassment, misogyny, misogynoir – and the cover-up that ensued.”

On Wednesday, a former trustee of Sentebale, Dr Kelello Lerotholi, told Sky’s royal correspondent Rhiannon Mills he did not recognise any of the allegations.

Dr Lerotholi said he had never witnessed these issues and that the claims “came to me as a surprise”.

Read more:
Prince Harry ‘in shock’ as he quits Sentebale charity
Charity misconduct claims ‘a surprise’, says Sentebale trustee

“I can honestly say, in the meetings I was present in, there was never even a hint of such,” he said.

“The general tone and conduct of the board has been one of respect for each other, accommodating each other’s opinions and inputs, and speaking with respect to each other.

“So this all came as a shock to me.”

Sentebale was established in 2006 to help children and young people in southern Africa, particularly those with HIV and Aids.

Prince Harry was inspired to start the charity after spending two months in Lesotho, when he was on a gap year in 2004.

He was in the small African country – which has one of the world’s highest rates of HIV and AIDS – as recently as last October.

You can watch Trevor Phillips’ full interview with Dr Sophie Chandauka tomorrow morning on ‘Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips’ from 8:30am on Sky News.

The government has been accused of “spin and tinkering” over an announcement about an increase in defence spending which falls far short of what is needed, Sky News understands.

An entire fleet of military helicopters – the Royal Air Force’s Puma aircraft – was retired this week as part of a cost-saving plan to scrap older kit that was announced in November.

The sight of old but still airworthy helicopters being taken out of service before a replacement is ready – creating a capability gap – contrasts with statements by Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, and John Healey, the defence secretary, about boosting the defence budget.

Sir Ben Wallace, the longest-serving Conservative defence secretary, said he had expected better given the urgent need to rearm at a time of heightened threats and following Donald Trump’s warnings to Europe to stop relying on the United States to bankroll its security.

“We are at the dawn of a new era of insecurity across the world,” Sir Ben said.

“The US has warned us for a decade about not taking them for granted, and we all did nothing. In Germany, Poland, and France the penny has dropped and they have embraced a necessary culture change and re-prioritisation of government spend.

“In the UK, the government still thinks it is about spin and tinkering. It fools no one, and we risk losing our credibility and leadership on defence amongst allies.”

In her spring statement on Wednesday, the chancellor announced an extra £2.2bn for defence this coming financial year.

Ms Reeves told MPs it was a further “down payment” on a promise by the prime minister to lift expenditure on defence to 2.5% of GDP from April 2027. Defence spending is currently around 2.3% of gross national income. The new money will help inch it up to 2.36%.

The chancellor, defence secretary and prime minister have repeatedly phrased their plan to inject cash into the armed forces over this parliament as “the biggest sustained increase in defence spending since the end of the Cold War”.

But defence insiders say, while any new money is welcome, this claim is more spin than substance because the defence budget largely suffered repeated cuts since the Soviet Union collapsed.

Also, focusing on a slogan does not answer the question of whether an extra £2bn over the next 12 months is enough to transform the British Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force at the speed that is necessary, they said.

Asked whether it was sufficient, multiple military sources and a defence industry source collectively said “no”.

“This is just another sticking plaster that overlooks decades of underinvestment and chronic financial mismanagement of our armed forces,” the defence industry source said.

“Increasing spending or a focus on ‘novel technologies’ ignores the fact that we have let a broken system flourish.

“Time and time again, we see celebration over procuring outdated solutions while their manufacturers get away with significant delays or overspends with seemingly few repercussions.

“While we continue to spin and fight over tiny percentages of spending, we are allowing our armed forces to get hollowed out in front of us, hoping that government soundbites will provide the deterrence that our current equipment can’t.”

A military source said the additional £2.2bn for the year to March 2026 was a step in the right direction, but said it would merely keep defence on “life support”.

The situation only starts to improve marginally in two years’ time when the defence budget is finally forecast to hit 2.5% of GDP, the source said.

Read more on Sky News
More than 1,000 killed in Myanmar earthquake
International aid starts to arrive after Myanmar earthquake
Mum and baby ‘safe’ after placenta found in park

This is despite the UK being a leading member of the “coalition of the willing”, with Sir Keir Starmer pledging to deploy forces to secure any ceasefire deal in Ukraine – a move that would put huge additional strain on his already stretched armed forces.

While the UK talks about 2.5% for the defence budget, Mark Rutte, the secretary general of NATO, says allies must spend more than 3%, while Mr Trump wants them to aim for 5%.

In 2020, Boris Johnson, as the prime minister, said a plan to increase the defence budget by £16bn over four years, on top of a commitment to lift defence spending by 0.5% above inflation for each year of the parliament – so what was described at the time as an additional £24bn in total – was the biggest boost to defence expenditure since the Cold War.

Sir Keir has added the word “sustained” when describing the size of his defence spending boost – though that will depend upon the accuracy of forecasts that GDP will expand at the rate predicted in the coming years.

Sir Ben said: “The UK is facing some of the highest threats in a generation, yet John Healey thinks spin is the appropriate response. He fools no one – not the men and women of the armed forces and not our enemies. I had expected better of him.”

UK stargazers were treated to a partial solar eclipse on Saturday morning, a phenomenon that sees the sun partially obscured by the moon.

Up to 40% of the sun was covered as the moon passed between the sun and Earth, partly obscuring the star.

Members of the public gathered to watch the spectacle in Greenwich while thousands more followed online.

“It’s a different way of experiencing the mechanics of the solar system for yourself,” said Catherine Muller, an astronomer at Royal Observatory to Sky News science correspondent Thomas Moore.

“We know about it theoretically, we know that the moon orbits the Earth and they might pass by us but really getting to see it in a new and different way is quite exciting for a lot of people.”

Looking directly at the sun is dangerous so astronomers used glasses, solar telescopes and pinhole cameras to watch the event.

The eclipse was visible across several other parts of the world, including western Europe, Greenland, north-west Africa and north-east North America.

For people in the southeast of England – where the weather meant the UK views were best – the peak of the eclipse was at around 11.03am.

At that point, around 30-40% of the sun was obscured, according to the Royal Observatory.

Northwest Scotland had the most coverage of the sun with 47.9% in Gallan Head, with Manchester getting 36.1% of coverage.

Dover had the least coverage of the sun with only 28.1%.

The next total solar eclipse is not for another 65 years in 2090, so Ms Muller recommends “making the most of the partial ones when they’re around”.