UK’s Princess Anne visits Singapore from Nov 12 to 13

SINGAPORE: Princess Anne, the sister of the United Kingdom’s King Charles III, will be in Singapore for a working visit from November 12 to 13.

“The Princess Royal’s visit is in conjunction with the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Singapore and the United Kingdom,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a press statement on Nov 11 (Tuesday).

The statement added that Princess Anne will be calling separately on President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. She is also scheduled to visit the Kranji War Memorial, the Airbus Asia Training Centre, and Rolls-Royce’s Seletar campus.

She has visited Singapore at least twice in previous years. The first time was in 1972 with her parents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip. Princess Anne was also in Singapore less than a decade ago, when she called on the Mission to Seafarers Singapore in November 2016.

The 75-year-old Princess has just come from a four-day visit to Australia, where she was accompanied by her husband, Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence.

While in Sydney on Nov 7, the Princess, who is the Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Australian Corps of Signals, was celebrating the corps’ 100th anniversary. She laid a wreath at the Anzac Memorial in Sydney together with Governor-General Sam Mostyn and attended a ceremonial parade at Victoria Barracks.

On Remembrance Day (Nov 11), she visited Gallipoli Barracks in Brisbane and also laid a wreath. With her husband, she met defence personnel and their families, as well as delivering a speech.

Born in 1950, Princess Anne is the second child and only daughter of Queen Elizabeth II, and is 18th in the line of succession to the throne. A former equestrian, she is the only member of the British Royal Family to have competed in the Olympic Games.

Her tour to Australia and Singapore comes at a time when the royal family is again under scrutiny, after it was announced on Oct 30 that her younger brother, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, would be stripped of his title and would need to move from his residence.

“Prince Andrew will now be known as Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. His lease on Royal Lodge has, to date, provided him with legal protection to continue in residence. Formal notice has now been served to surrender the lease and he will move to alternative private accommodation,” Buckingham Palace said at the time.

His disgrace is in connection with allegations of links not only to Jeffrey Epstein but also to the son of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, who is said to have committed crimes against humanity. /TISG

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