Prince Harry has dropped his libel case against the publisher of the British tabloid Mail on Sunday, which he attacked over an article about his police protection during his visit to the United Kingdom, the publication announced Friday.
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The controversial article, published in February 2022, wrongly accused Harry of “lying” and “attempting to keep secret” his objection to the government to obtain police protection during his visits to the UK, the defense said .
King Charles III's youngest son, who has filed numerous lawsuits against the tabloids, filed a motion that would have allowed him to settle the matter without going to trial. But the courts rejected it in December and he also had to pay £48,000 (56,000 euros) to the newspaper's publisher.
Faced with the prospect of having to defend the case in court, the Duke of Sussex “admitted defeat” on the day his lawyers had to submit new documents to the courts, as we wrote on Friday in an article by another tabloid from the same group can read the Chron.
“Instead, Harry threw in the towel and his lawyers informed the Supreme Court at 10am that he was dropping the case,” it said.
“He now has to pay the newspaper's costs of £250,000 (€290,000) as well as his own legal fees, bringing the total bill to more than £750,000 (€874,000),” the Chron said.
After Harry and his wife Meghan Markle leave the royal family and the United Kingdom, they are no longer entitled to police protection at the expense of the British taxpayer.
Charles' second son, who therefore sometimes has to resort to private protection at his own expense, had applied to be able to benefit from police protection during his stay in the UK and to be able to pay for it from his personal funds, but this application was rejected by the courts in May.
He has launched a second procedure on this issue, challenging the cessation of systematic support for his security during his stay in the UK.
Harry's appeal against the British Home Office specifically concerns the authorities' decision in February 2020 to only grant him police protection in individual cases. The decision was reserved.