Why Queen Elizabeth Deeply Regretted Not Attending An Important Meeting In Singapore
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Queen Elizabeth II previously agreed to not attend an important meeting in Singapore but she reportedly regrets her decision until today.
Royal biographer Robert Hardman said that there was a huge controversy surrounding the Commonwealth heads of state meeting in Singapore shortly after Edward Heath became the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
In his book “Queen of the World,” Hardman said that Heath’s political stance made it difficult for Her Majesty to attend the meeting. This was because Heath wanted to implement a deeply unpopular policy that threatened to split the Commonwealth.
“He was going to resume arms sales to the apartheid regime in South Africa. As a result, he had bad news for the Queen… Knowing that his policy would create a poisonous atmosphere in Singapore, he formally advised her that she should not attend, explaining that she might be drawn into an embarrassing dispute,” he said.
The Queen agreed to not attend the meeting, but she has regretted her decision until today. John Campbell, Heath’s biographer, said that the Queen felt deeply unhappy with her decision.
“For a relatively new Prime Minister to tell the Queen in her 20th year as Head of the Commonwealth that she was not to attend an important assembly of her beloved organization must have been a challenge, even for someone as thick-skinned as Heath… What we do know is that the Queen was determined to not miss another one,” Campbell said.
Meanwhile, royal author Kitty Kelley talked about the Queen’s personality whenever she would attend important meetings. Several years ago, Her Majesty didn’t seem as confident as to how she is now.
In fact, there were several instances wherein the monarch looked self-conscious about the gaps in her education. Her husband, Prince Philip, was quite the opposite.
The Duke of Edinburgh talked to everyone with confidence. Prince Philip didn’t also have any problems talking about different things. The Queen, on the other hand, worried constantly about what she would say.
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