Al Qaeda called for Prince Harry’s murder and said his death would ‘please the Muslim community’ in a threat after his taxpayer-funded bodyguards were pulled following Megxit, his lawyer told the High Court today.
The bombshell claim was made as the Duke of Sussex flew from Montecito to the Royal Courts of Justice in London for the latest stage of his legal battle with the Home Office.
In February 2020, the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) decided he should receive a different degree of protection when in the country, and he is appealing against a High Court ruling dismissing his case against the Home Office over the decision last year.
His barrister Shaheed Fatima KC said in written submissions that Al Qaeda had called for Harry ‘to be murdered’ after the decision in February 2020 to change the level of security the duke is given while in the UK.
She said that Harry’s security team were informed that the terrorist group had published a document which stated that his ‘assassination would please the Muslim community’.
An exact date for Al Qaeda’s assassination threat was not revealed in Harry’s legal submission, which was published as the appeal began today.
But in 2023 it was reported that he received death threats when he wrote in his tell-all autobiography Spare about killing 25 Taliban fighters while fighting in Afghanistan, comparing the the victims to chess pieces.
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, walks with security as he arrives at the Royal Courts of Justice for his legal battle with the UK Government over his personal protection
Prince Harry making pre-flight checks in the cockpit at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan in 2012. He wrote in Spare about killing 25 Taliban fighters
Shaheed Fatima KC, watched by her client the Duke of Sussex, said in written submissions that Al Qaeda had called for Harry ‘to be murdered’ after the decision in February 2020 to change the level of security the duke is given while in the UK
Shaheed Fatima KC also told the court that Harry and the Duchess of Sussex were also involved in a ‘dangerous car pursuit with paparazzi’ in New York in May 2023 involving ‘reckless disregard of vehicle and traffic laws’.
She continued: ‘The judge’s analysis on the construction and application of the terms of reference and evaluation criteria for decision-making erred in three respects.
‘The judge wrongly and inappropriately deferred to Ravec in interpreting the terms of reference and evaluation criteria for decision-making.
‘The judge failed to appreciate the role of the RMB (risk management board) analysis in Ravec’s decision-making.
‘The judge erred in finding that the terms of reference granted Ravec the discretion to simply not use the terms of reference in certain cases.’
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex ‘felt forced to step back’ from their roles as senior working royals as they felt they ‘were not being protected by the institution’, the Court of Appeal was also told.
Harry and his wife Meghan quit as senior working royals in January 2020 but ‘wished to continue their duties in support of the late Queen as privately funded members of the royal family’, the duke’s barristers told a hearing on Tuesday.
In written submissions, Shaheed Fatima KC, for the duke, said: ‘On 8 January 2020, (the duke) and his wife felt forced to step back from the role of full time official working members of the royal family as they considered they were not being protected by the institution, but they wished to continue their duties in support of the late Queen as privately funded members of the royal family.’
In her written submissions, parts of which were redacted for confidentiality reasons, Ms Fatima said Ravec ruled in 2020 that ‘there is no basis for publicly funded security support for the duke and duchess within Great Britain’.
Ms Fatima said the duke’s security ‘does not appear to have been discussed at any formal Ravec meeting’, adding there were ‘no official notes or detailed minutes recording the approach to be taken’ to his protection.
The court was told that a meeting took place at Buckingham Palace on January 27 2020, but in February 2020, Sir Richard Mottram – the then-chairman of Ravec – said a risk management board (RMB) assessment would not be carried out for the duke.
In court on Tuesday, Ms Fatima said that by failing to undertake an RMB assessment, Ravec ‘did not apply its own terms of reference’ to its decision-making process, and came up with a ‘different and so-called ‘bespoke process” for Harry.
She continued in written submissions that the decision was made ‘despite the existence of the other categories that only Ravec knew of at the time and which, as (the duke) now knows, do provide a basis for protective security’.
This meant the duke was ‘not in a position to make any informed representations to Ravec’.
The Duke of Sussex and his wife Meghan Markle ‘felt forced to step back’ from frontline royal duties in 2020 ‘as they considered they were not being protected by the institution’, his KC Shaheed Fatima (pictured today) has said
The Home Office, which is legally responsible for Ravec’s decisions, is opposing the appeal.
Its barrister Sir James Eadie KC said in written submissions that the appeal ‘involves a continued failure to see the wood for the trees’.
He said: ‘Whether by reference to rationality generally, or by reference to the absence of an RMB analysis, (the duke) cannot show that the judge was wrong to reject his claim that his circumstances were so exceptional as to justify not just the specific bespoke process focused on him, but to require general inclusion within the Ravec cohort.’
The hearing before Sir Geoffrey Vos, Lord Justice Bean and Lord Justice Edis is due to conclude on Wednesday with a decision expected in writing at a later
