Published on March 26, 2023 at 10:13 a.m.
Visit of Charles III postponed: France under the magnifying glass of British dailies – ©Aleks Marinkovic
The royal trip was canceled following protests against the pension reform. Many British newspapers devoted their front pages to this event. Yet this type of diplomatic decision happens more often than you might think.
On Friday March 24, the daily Times headlined “chaos reigns in France”. A full-page photo of the streets of Paris under the rubbish occupied the front page of the newspaper. After the cancellation of the royal visit of Prince Charles, France is making the front page of national newspapers.
THE Telegram, meanwhile, title on a tag in English left on a wall in the capital: “Charles III, do you know the guillotine? The very conservative newspaper welcomes the cancellation of this visit and headlines “resetting the link between the European Union and the United Kingdom in disarray”.
THE DailyMail, for his part, affirms that “Macron submits to the populace”. Evocative titles that give an overview of how France is perceived by its neighbor across the Channel.
This type of cancellation, revealing diplomatic tensions between countries, is however not so rare. In 2000, when the extreme right had just entered parliament in Austria, Charles, then Prince of Wales, canceled his visit.
In 2016, Vladimir Putin canceled his visit to France due to French criticism of his government. The support of the Russian president to Bashar Al-Assad in Syria does not pass with François Hollande.
The president with the most canceled appointments is none other than former US President Donald Trump. After tensions with Denmark over Greenland, Trump cancels his visit to the country. He also manages to get angry with the North Korean president Kim Jong-Un or with the Mexican president, Enrique Pena Nieto, who protests against the construction of a wall between the two countries.
In the context of these diplomatic meetings, nothing should be left to chance. In 1999, for example, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami canceled his visit to France because the Elysée had planned to serve wine at the table.