Queen Elizabeth and Duchess Meghan's father, Thomas Markle. Pictures: Reuters and Screengrab/Facebook
Thomas Markle has blasted his daughter Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, and her husband, Prince Harry, for their “unforgivable” decision not to attend Prince Philip's memorial service.
The retired lighting director – who hasn't seen his daughter since before her 2018 wedding and has never met her husband – branded the couple's failure to fly to the UK to attend a service in celebration of the life of the prince's late grandfather last week a “slap in the face for the Queen”.
Speaking on his YouTube channel, Thomas fumed: “Attending and giving respect and giving God's grace to Prince Philip for a lifetime of service was very important to the Queen, and for them to not show up was a slap in the face to the Queen.
“It was unforgivable. The British people won't forgive them for that, and they shouldn't.
“I don't know what the reason was, but there's no excuse at all. It’s a slap in the face for the Queen and the British people.”
Harry is taking legal action against the Home Office as he is no longer given armed police protection when he’s in the UK and has been told he cannot pay for that himself.
But Richard Griffin, who was a royal protection officer for the Duke of Edinburgh – who died last April aged 99 – for 14 years insisted security concerns were a “pathetic excuse” for Harry not to join the rest of his family at the service.
He said: “Prince Philip was their grandfather so William has obviously had a great training from him and is going to learn examples from him. I just hope Harry gets some of these things in his mind.
“It (Harry not being here) was a big disappointment for everybody. People were talking about it. Certainly around where I was people were saying he should have been here.
"All this nonsense about how he couldn’t get protection, as far as I’m concerned that was a pathetic excuse. He should’ve been here to honour his grandfather.
“At the end of the day, if he was that worried about security, he could’ve stuck with his brother and father who have got wonderful security and he would have been more than safe.”
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