The optics of the royal tour of the Caribbean have not been great, writes @mounth
📷The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge looked more than a little awkward as they “shook their waists like nobody’s business” and played the drums in Belize and Jamaica
The royals’ visit coincided with a swelling wave of republicanism in the Caribbean.
🇧🇿 First, farmers in Belize, protesting about land rights, stopped the couple’s first appointment
🇯🇲Then, when the Cambridges got to Jamaica, Prime Minister Andrew Holness made it plain that the country’s true ambitions are “as an independent, developed, prosperous country”
Prince William did his best to fend off anti-colonialist attacks in his Jamaica speech, expressing his “profound sorrow” for slavery which “should never have happened”.
❓But was it too little too late?
👑Is the monarchy rapidly becoming an anachronism in the Caribbean and elsewhere in the Commonwealth?
And will the Commonwealth itself soon be a thing of the past – not just when the Queen sadly goes but even before that?
🗣️ “Once the Queen is gone, I suspect the Commonwealth will be finished. This Caribbean tour seemed patronising and outdated. Kate and William dancing and drum-beating was excruciating" says royal biographer Anna Pasternak
It is possible to maintain that umbilical link between the monarchy and the Commonwealth, writes @mounth
➡️But few would argue against a need for the monarch and their advisers to establish a modern and delicate balancing act – to maintain the Commonwealth as a club of equals
⚽️Euro 2020 saw the men’s teams split a prize fund of £275 million.
How many times more is this than the prize money for the women's Euro 2022?
It's 20x higher
Steph Houghton, the England women’s football captain, said:
🗣️“Football clubs and sponsors are increasing investment into the sport more than ever before, but prize money seems to have a glass ceiling that needs to be broken. Let’s work together to #CloseTheGap”
🔴Zelensky has said that Europe acted "a little too late" to stop Russia from invading Ukraine, claiming countries should have sanctioned Moscow and blocked the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline earlier
🔴Russian forces fired two missiles late on Thursday at a Ukrainian military unit on the outskirts of Dnipro, regional emergency services said telegraph.co.uk/world-news/202…
🇬🇧Britain will double its troops in Eastern Europe and send a new deployment to Bulgaria, after Nato leaders on Thursday agreed to strengthen the alliance’s eastern flank against Russian aggression.
Survival, heroism and utter tragedy: Bedside tales from a front line Kyiv hospital.
As Ukraine's resistance against Russia grows, Kyiv's A&E units remain as busy as ever - with staff often as traumatised as patients, reports @colinfreeman99.
🔴While most of its A&E medics are no strangers to bloodshed, few have dealt with so many warzone casualties before as this A&E department
🗣️“It has been a terrible time for all of us,” said surgeon Denys Reizin.
“We see young people coming in without legs, and a lot of blood, brains, ripped-up abdomens and so on. I thought I’d get used to it, but I still can’t believe it’s happening”