Published: Less than 20 min ago
1 of 5 Photo: Martin Sylvest/Ritzau/TT
Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II rounded off the celebration of her 50 years on the throne on Saturday with a motorcade through Copenhagen and lunch at City Hall. And despite tensions within the family, both sons were present.
The celebration of the 82-year-old monarch was originally supposed to take place earlier this year, but has had to be postponed several times, due to covid-19 and later the death of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth in September.
But on Saturday, it was time for Europe’s only reigning queen to wave to the people gathered at Rådhusplatsen and have lunch together with specially invited guests.
Queen Margrethe’s two sons, Crown Prince Frederik and Prince Joachim, were also present with their wives. It has been a turbulent autumn for the Danish royal family since the queen announced at the end of September that Prince Joachim’s four children from the turn of the year will no longer be allowed to call themselves prince and princess.
The reason for the radical decision is to, like other royal houses, carry out adaptations that “will make the monarchy relevant also in the future”.
The decision did not go down well with the princely couple, who publicly aired their displeasure, forcing the Queen to issue a new communiqué in which she admitted that she underestimated how much her youngest son and his family were affected by the decision.
“It has made a great impression, and I am sorry for it,” wrote the Queen.
At the beginning of October, it was announced that Prince Joachim and Queen Margrethe had met at Fredensborg Castle for “conversations” and that an agreement had been reached to move forward after the infected title dispute.
Earlier this autumn, the queen was celebrated with a gala performance at the Royal Theater in the company of heads of state, politicians, family, cultural figures and a large number of royals from other countries – including Sweden’s King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia.