TWO knighthoods awarded in the Queen's Birthday Honours have provoked a diplomatic row with Canada.
Tony Blair has come under personal attack from Jean Chrétien, Canada's Prime Minister, for not consulting Ottawa. A formal diplomatic protest was also made. The knighthoods were awarded to Prof George Bain, vice-chancellor of Queen's University, Belfast, who chaired the Low Pay Commission, and to Terence Matthews, the billionaire Welsh-born high-tech pioneer.
Mr Chrétien telephoned Mr Blair last Friday when he learned that the knighthood for Prof Bain was to be announced the next morning. He was said to have expressed his annoyance in "very forceful" terms. Francie Ducros, a spokesman for Mr Chrétien, said that Mr Blair said he had not been aware that Prof Bain held dual citizenship and it was too late to change the list.
Mr Chrétien was furious to find on Saturday that the list included Mr Matthews, who holds dual nationality. He wrote to Mr Blair, "to express in the strongest terms the objections of the government of Canada and my personal objections to the way in which your government has dealt with the question of honours bestowed on Canadian citizens".
He said that for 80 years Canada had refused to permit its citizens to accept honours which carried a title. "I made you aware some two years ago of the difficulties in which the Canadian government was placed by the intention of the government of the United Kingdom to grant a title. The difficulties resulted in protracted and acrimonious litigation."
This was a reference to the court battle following Mr Chrétien's refusal to allow the elevation to the peerage of Conrad Black, proprietor of The Telegraph Group. Mr Black had been recommended for the honour in 1999 by William Hague. It was accepted by the Government and confirmation was sought from Canada that there was no legal impediment.
This was agreed provided Mr Black became a British citizen, which he did, holding dual nationality. Mr Chrétien intervened at the last moment to veto the peerage, claiming that it could not be granted while Mr Black retained his Canadian nationality. Mr Black sued in the Canadian courts, accusing Mr Chrétien of negligence and abuse of process. He lost and has since renounced his Canadian citizenship.
Mr Black said last night: "All UK citizens have equal rights to recognition in the United Kingdom and it is improper for any other government to try to exploit the fact of dual citizenship to reduce the rights of UK citizens." The policy cited by Mr Chrétien has no statutory force and was not observed by his predecessors.
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Photographers charged over Diana's death (UK Times)
FROM ADAM SAGE IN PARIS
TWO of the photographers who pursued Diana, Princess of Wales, on the night of her death in 1997 have been charged under French privacy laws in connection with the fatal accident.
Serge Benhamou and Laszlo Veres are being investigated after a formal complaint from Mohamed Al Fayed on behalf of his son, Dodi, who died with the Princess.
A third photographer, Jacques Langevin, was also placed under official investigation — the equivalent of charging a suspect under British law — two weeks ago.
The three men were among nine photographers and one motorcyclist who were cleared in September 1999 of allegations that they had been responsible for the accident in August 1997. They had followed the Princess’s car from the Ritz Hotel in central Paris to the Alma underpass, where it swerved and crashed. Some took photographs before and after the accident.
In his final report after a painstaking two-year inquiry Judge Hervé Stéphan laid the blame on the shoulders of the Princess’s chauffeur, Henri Paul, who, he said, had been drunk and driving at excessive speeds. M Paul also died in a crash that left only one survivor — the Princess’s bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones.
Despite Judge Stéphan’s report, the Paris Appeal Court ruled recently that he had failed to investigate allegations that the photographers were guilty of breaching privacy laws. It therefore upheld Mr Al Fayed’s call for an inquiry.
Virginie Bardet, the lawyer representing M Benhamou and M Veres, said that her clients were innocent because they refrained from taking pictures of the victims inside the car. “They were not harming privacy because they only took pictures of the outside,” she said. “They were doing their job.”
Under French law invasion of privacy carries a maximum sentence of one year in prison and a fine Fr300,000 (£28,000). It is extremely rare for defendants to be jailed.
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Beatrice waves to Granny One(Electronic Telegraph)
By Caroline Davies
THERE was one very special and familiar face among the crowds gathered outside St George's Chapel, Windsor for the centuries-old ceremony of the Order of the Garter yesterday.
Princess Beatrice, the 12-year-old daughter of the Duke of York, sat on a kerbstone with schoolfriends cheering and taking photographs of the procession of the Knights Companions of The Most Noble Order of the Garter. The Princess, a day pupil at nearby St George's, Ascot, waved as first the Prince of Wales and the Princess Royal passed followed by the Queen and Prince Philip, each wearing the velvet robes and ostrich plumes that denote the oldest and most senior order of chivalry.
The Queen, whom the Princess calls "Granny One", spotted her enthusiastic granddaughter in the 2,000-strong crowd, and waved back. The Princess had waited for up to two hours for the procession and service, during which Sir Antony Acland, former head of the diplomatic service and ambassador to Washington, and Field Marshal Lord Inge, former Chief of the Defence Staff, were installed as Knights Companion.
She discarded her school blazer and straw boater in the summmer heat, and at one time playfully poked out her tongue at a nearby policemen who got in the way of her camera.
Sir Antony, 71, and Lord Inge, 65, were officially invested at a service at Windsor Castle. The 600-year-old ceremony involves the tying of a garter under their left knee while they formally pledge their allegiance in the fight against the forces of evil. Following the investiture and a lunch at the Castle, the new Knights Companion process down the hill to St George's Chapel. There are only 24 Knights Companion at any one time, and they currently include Lady Thatcher and Lord Callaghan of Cardiff.
One absentee from the 40-minute church service was Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, who will be 101 next month. She had been present at Windsor Castle during the investiture, but decided to miss the service, a rare occurrence because she was said to be "pacing herself".
The Queen Mother, who was made a Lady of the Garter 64 years ago by her husband George VI as a thank-you for helping guide him through the 1936 Abdication crisis, has had a busy few days which included attending Trooping the Colour on Saturday, and paying an official visit to the Isle of Dogs, east London. A Buckingham Palace spokesman said she was in good health, and fully intended to be at Ascot this week.
The Duchess of York has been asked to appear for a second time as a reporter on the current affairs series Tonight with Trevor McDonald. Producers at Granada were so impressed by a film she made on obesity, which was shown in April, that they have invited her to conduct a second investigation, this time about skin cancer.
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Day in the palace for king turned election winner(Electronic Telegraph)
By Julius Strauss in Sofia
SIMEON II of Bulgaria celebrated his dramatic return to the public stage yesterday in a sprawling former royal summer residence outside the capital, Sofia.
Rather than make a public address to his supporters after his election victory, he remained closeted all day with his wife, four sons and daughter in one of the homes he played in as a boy king in the 1940s before his expulsion by the Communists.
Sources close to Simeon Saxe-Coburg, who spent more than 50 years in exile, said he was carefully weighing his next political step. Aides said the former boy king might decide to take the post of prime minister or adopt a more informal role as a moral authority behind the scenes.
At the entrance to the Vrana estate two security guards carrying pistols stood by two old wooden guardhouses behind a padlocked and rusting green gate. A uniformed policeman cycled through the leafy park surrounding the residence on an old red bicycle, with a truncheon at his waist.
The guards turned away several members of the public seeking to gain an audience with their former boy king. One woman claimed she had a missive for him that she had to deliver personally. An elderly man in a crumpled sky-blue uniform and a peaked cap decorated with the Soviet star said he was the former king's long-lost brother.
Late in the afternoon Simeon, who is a distant relative of the Queen, finally emerged to attend a small party at his campaign headquarters in central Sofia. Supporters and candidates travelled in taxis and private cars. They included a rock star, several schoolteachers and at least one actor. A huge chocolate cake was carried in, decorated with the words: "Congratulations on your victory."
When Simeon, 64, arrived in a black Mercedes supporters cheered and clapped. The extent of his victory in the weekend election was becoming clear yesterday with official preliminary results giving his party more than 43 per cent of the vote and perhaps 120 out of 240 seats in the parliament.
An heir to another of eastern Europe's thrones, celebrating in Sofia early yesterday, said: "We thought he would do well but nobody imagined it would be this well." Once final results are announced tomorrow, the king's party, the National Movement for Simeon II, will begin negotiations on a coalition government.
Simeon, who ruled as a boy king between 1943 and 1946 after the death of his father, King Boris, has said he wants to set up a government of national consensus. The Union for Democratic Forces, a reform-orientated party that has ruled for the past four years, may join the coalition, despite attacking Simeon vehemently during the campaign.
Ivan Kostov, the outgoing reformist prime minister, said yesterday: "We have taken a lot of unpopular decisions and made a lot of mistakes. We wanted the voter to pay a higher price than he was prepared to pay."
Simeon is ideologically closer to the UDF than the other major party, the Socialists, but some aides predict that Mr Kostov may go into opposition, in the hope that Simeon's popularity will collapse if he fails to deliver significant economic benefits.
At the huge Kremikovtsti steel processing plant a few miles outside Sofia, workers were jubilant. They expect the king to use his Western contacts and business know-how to bring a swift economic upturn. Ali Hussein, a supervisor, said: "We all celebrated last night - eating, drinking and firing in the air. The king has promised economic prosperity; of course we're happy."
Zlatan Tsvetanov, 36, a mechanic who keeps the huge mills running, said: "Ninety per cent of us here voted for the king. We are working class, but everybody else has sold us out." With expectations so high, Simeon faces a difficult task maintaining popular support. Georgi Petkov, a bar owner who voted for him, said: "We really expect a lot. Now he's won, we have one eye on our wallets and the other on our watches."
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King orders security review(Electronic Telegraph)
KING Gyanendra of Nepal has ordered a palace security review after Crown Prince Dipendra shot dead almost the entire royal family on June 1 with weapons drawn from the palace armoury.
A former general, Shanta Kumar Malla, has been appointed to head the inquiry. Rahul Bedi, New Delhi