ShiningIce
3rd Level Green Feather
- Joined
- Feb 14, 2002
- Messages
- 4,702
- Points
- 36
LONDON (Reuters) - Revelling in public affection just months ago, Britain's royal family was struggling to retain its dignity on Monday as a rape claim and week of embarrassing tales by a butler enveloped them in fresh scandal.
Royal aides -- who coordinated Queen Elizabeth's successful Golden Jubilee celebrations over the summer -- were holding "emergency" meetings at London's Buckingham and St James' Palaces to plot a way of stemming the unwelcome media fest.
The man at the center of it all, Princess Diana's former butler Paul Burrell, was out of the country in New York. But his planned interviews with U.S. media were sure to keep the unwelcome spotlight on the royals.
In a week of Burrell's "downstairs" tales of life with Diana, who died in a 1997 Paris car-crash, the most serious allegation to emerge was of a gay rape involving royal servants.
Following the butler's revelation that Diana made a tape of remarks by the alleged victim, ex-royal servant George Smith came forward at the weekend to claim he was raped by one of Prince Charles's servants in 1989 and the man tried to assault him again in 1995.
In a newspaper interview, he accused Charles of trying to cover up the incident by thwarting an internal inquiry into the allegations. The unnamed man at the center of the allegations denied that and denounced "the current media frenzy."
Whatever the truth, the rape claim has further whipped up a scandal-hungry media, already full of Burrell's stories of Diana's romantic liaisons, squabbles over her possessions after death, and other shenanigans in the royal corridors.
SECOND "ANNUS HORRIBILIS?"
The stories have been a personal nightmare for the queen in the year she marks 50 years on the throne.
"All the good done by the Golden Jubilee is diminishing day by day," wrote one of Britain's best-known royal-watchers, columnist Richard Kay. "The image of the Windsors has been blackened by each twist, from the widespread flogging off of royal gifts to the rampant promiscuity of gay palace staff." The Burrell saga, plus the death earlier this year of the queen's mother and sister, are threatening to turn 2002 into a repeat of her famous "annus horribilis" in 1992.
Then, her son Charles split from Diana and a fire ravaged her castle at Windsor outside London.
It has also undermined the queen's effort to bury a decade of royal peccadilloes: from toe-sucking by Prince Andrew's ex-wife Sarah Ferguson to steamy phone calls from both Charles and Diana to their respective lovers.
Warnings from some that "Burrellgate," as some media are gleefully dubbing the affair, threatens the very foundations of the royal family still seem alarmist given the monarchy's endurance of worst scandals in the past.
But calls for constitutional reform, in the wake of the queen's unprecedented personal intervention to end the trial of Burrell for alleged theft of Diana's belongings, are being taken more seriously. Some are also demanding an independent inquiry into the rape allegation.
Royal biographer Robert Lacey predicted, however, that the royal family would once again ride the storm and blamed the modern media -- particularly Britain's downmarket tabloids who often pay huge sums for stories -- for their predicament.
"I see nothing here in the royals' behavior that was not happening 80 or 100 years' ago," Lacey told Reuters. "The difference is that now we know more about it because we have an ever-less deferential tabloid press willing to exploit elements previously treated with discretion and privacy."
Royal aides -- who coordinated Queen Elizabeth's successful Golden Jubilee celebrations over the summer -- were holding "emergency" meetings at London's Buckingham and St James' Palaces to plot a way of stemming the unwelcome media fest.
The man at the center of it all, Princess Diana's former butler Paul Burrell, was out of the country in New York. But his planned interviews with U.S. media were sure to keep the unwelcome spotlight on the royals.
In a week of Burrell's "downstairs" tales of life with Diana, who died in a 1997 Paris car-crash, the most serious allegation to emerge was of a gay rape involving royal servants.
Following the butler's revelation that Diana made a tape of remarks by the alleged victim, ex-royal servant George Smith came forward at the weekend to claim he was raped by one of Prince Charles's servants in 1989 and the man tried to assault him again in 1995.
In a newspaper interview, he accused Charles of trying to cover up the incident by thwarting an internal inquiry into the allegations. The unnamed man at the center of the allegations denied that and denounced "the current media frenzy."
Whatever the truth, the rape claim has further whipped up a scandal-hungry media, already full of Burrell's stories of Diana's romantic liaisons, squabbles over her possessions after death, and other shenanigans in the royal corridors.
SECOND "ANNUS HORRIBILIS?"
The stories have been a personal nightmare for the queen in the year she marks 50 years on the throne.
"All the good done by the Golden Jubilee is diminishing day by day," wrote one of Britain's best-known royal-watchers, columnist Richard Kay. "The image of the Windsors has been blackened by each twist, from the widespread flogging off of royal gifts to the rampant promiscuity of gay palace staff." The Burrell saga, plus the death earlier this year of the queen's mother and sister, are threatening to turn 2002 into a repeat of her famous "annus horribilis" in 1992.
Then, her son Charles split from Diana and a fire ravaged her castle at Windsor outside London.
It has also undermined the queen's effort to bury a decade of royal peccadilloes: from toe-sucking by Prince Andrew's ex-wife Sarah Ferguson to steamy phone calls from both Charles and Diana to their respective lovers.
Warnings from some that "Burrellgate," as some media are gleefully dubbing the affair, threatens the very foundations of the royal family still seem alarmist given the monarchy's endurance of worst scandals in the past.
But calls for constitutional reform, in the wake of the queen's unprecedented personal intervention to end the trial of Burrell for alleged theft of Diana's belongings, are being taken more seriously. Some are also demanding an independent inquiry into the rape allegation.
Royal biographer Robert Lacey predicted, however, that the royal family would once again ride the storm and blamed the modern media -- particularly Britain's downmarket tabloids who often pay huge sums for stories -- for their predicament.
"I see nothing here in the royals' behavior that was not happening 80 or 100 years' ago," Lacey told Reuters. "The difference is that now we know more about it because we have an ever-less deferential tabloid press willing to exploit elements previously treated with discretion and privacy."
