BBC UK News(2022.04.15)

BBC UK News(2022.04.15)

Harry and Meghan visit Queen on way to Invictus Games

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex met the Queen on Thursday after flying into the UK, a spokesperson for the couple confirmed to the BBC.

The couple stopped at Windsor on their way to The Hague, in the Netherlands, for the Invictus Games.

Prince Harry was last reported to be in the UK in July, while Meghan is not thought to have been in the country since 2020.

The Sussexes stepped down as senior royals in January 2020.

Their trip to the UK comes after Prince Harry was absent from a memorial service for his grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh, in London last month.

The Queen is not expected to attend this year’s Easter morning church service having already pulled out of the Maundy Service on Thursday - for the first time since 1970.

The 95-year-old monarch has mobility problems and has pulled out of several events recently, including the annual Commonwealth Service.

Royal Family tree and line of succession
Charles stands in for Queen at Maundy Service
The duchess last appeared in the UK at the Commonwealth Day Service in March 2020 while the duke was in the UK to unveil a statue of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, in July last year.

The couple are on their way to the Invictus Games in the Netherlands, which will take place from 16 to 22 April.

A film crew is expected to be joining the couple at the games as part of filming for a Netflix series called Heart Of Invictus.

Prince Harry founded the games to aid the rehabilitation of injured or sick military personnel and veterans from across the globe.

Joe Little, managing editor of Majesty Magazine, described the visit as “a very welcome if long overdue move” on the part of Harry and Meghan.

The couple’s visit comes as Prince Harry is bringing a court challenge against the government’s decision to refuse police security during his visits from the US.

His lawyers previously said that the UK would “always be his home” and it “goes without saying that he does want to come back to see family and friends”.

Since the duchess was last in the UK she has given an emotional interview in which she said life in the Royal Family had been so difficult she “didn’t want to be alive any more” and the couple’s daughter Lillibet, named after the Queen’s family nickname, was born.

But while it may have been some time since the duchess has seen the Queen in person, during an appearance on The Late Late Show in 2021 Prince Harry revealed that the monarch had used Zoom to video call the family.

Sunken Russian warship Moskva: What do we know?

Russia’s flagship Black Sea missile cruiser has sunk after being “seriously damaged”, Russian state media says.

The defence ministry said ammunition on the Moskva exploded in an unexplained fire and that the ship tipped over while being towed back to port.

Ukraine claims it struck the vessel with its Neptune missiles.

The 510-crew warship had led Russia’s naval assault on Ukraine, which made it an important symbolic and military target.

Earlier in the conflict the Moskva gained notoriety after calling on Ukrainian border troops defending Snake Island in the Black Sea to surrender - to which they memorably radioed a message of refusal which loosely translates as “go to hell”.

Unexplained fire or a missile attack?
Prior to the sinking, Russia’s defence ministry issued a statement saying “the vessel is seriously damaged. The entire crew have been evacuated”.

On Thursday afternoon, it said a fire onboard had been contained and that it would be towing the warship back to port.

But a statement issued later on Thursday said that, while being towed, the ship “lost its balance due to damage sustained in the hull”.

“Given the choppy seas, the vessel sank,” it said.

Moscow again blamed the blast on an unexplained fire, making no mention of any missile strike.

But Ukraine says it is responsible for an attack on the cruiser, which it claims it targeted with recently-introduced Ukrainian-made missiles.

In a Facebook post before the ship sank, Ukrainian officials said Russian rescue efforts were being hampered by ammunition exploding on board and bad weather.

The BBC has not been able to verify either claim.

The history of the Moskva cruiser
Originally built in Ukraine in the Soviet-era, the vessel entered service in the early 1980s according to Russian media.

The missile cruiser was previously deployed by Moscow in the Syria conflict where it supplied Russian forces in the country with naval protection.

It carried over a dozen Vulkan anti-ship missiles and an array of anti-submarine and mine-torpedo weapons, the reports said.

The Moskva is the second major Russian ship known to have been destroyed since the invasion began.

What defences did the Moskva have?
The Slava-class cruiser was the third largest vessel in Russia’s active fleet and one of its most heavily defended assets, naval expert Jonathan Bentham from the International Institute for Strategic Studies told the BBC.

The cruiser was equipped with a triple-tiered air defence system that if operating properly should have given it three opportunities to defend itself from a Neptune missile attack.

In addition to medium- and short-range defences, it could engage six short-range close-in weapon systems (CIWS) as a last resort.

Mr Bentham said Moskva should have had 360-degree anti-air defence coverage.

“The CIWS system can fire 5,000 rounds in a minute, essentially creating a wall of flak around the cruiser, its last line of defence,” he said.

If the strike is proven to have come from a missile it “raises questions over the capabilities of the modernisation of the Russian surface fleet: whether it had enough ammunition, whether it had engineering issues”.

“Essentially, you’d have thought that with that three-tiered anti-air defence system it would be very hard to hit,” the military expert added.

Neptune missiles
Kyiv military officials say they struck the Moskva with a Ukrainian-made Neptune missile.

The cruise missile system was designed by Ukrainian military engineers in response to the growing naval threat posed by Russia in the Black Sea, following its annexation of Crimea in 2014.

According to the Kyiv Post, the Ukrainian navy only received its first delivery of the 300km-range (186 miles) Neptune missiles in March last year.

Since the invasion began Ukraine has received an influx of military aid from Western allies, including £100m worth of anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles that the UK announced it would be sending last week.

Black Sea dominance
The warship was a “symbol of Russian naval power in the Black Sea,” Michael Petersen of the Russia Maritime Studies Institute told the BBC.

“The Moskva had been a thorn in the side of the Ukrainians since the beginning of this conflict,” he said, adding that to see it destroyed would be “a real morale boost to the Ukrainians.”

The Russian military has been dominant in the Black Sea since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, and has used its presence there to launch and supply the invasion.

Its Black Sea fleet has supported the war with the capacity to launch cruise missiles anywhere in Ukraine, and has been important in supporting Russian attempts to seize Mariupol.

Russia says ammo aboard famed warship detonated

Ammunition stockpiles aboard a Russian ship that was famously defied by Ukrainian troops early in the war have detonated, according to a statement from the Russian defence ministry.

A fire caused the explosion on the Moskva, the statement in Russian media said, adding that all sailors had evacuated beforehand.

The statement said: "The cruiser Moskva’s ammunition has detonated as a result of a fire on the warship.

“The vessel is seriously damaged. The entire crew have been evacuated. The cause of the blaze is being investigated.”

It did not specify the cause of the fire.

But earlier on Wednesday, the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet was hit by Ukrainian rockets, according to the governor of Odesa.

Ukrainian officials said Russia was struggling to rescue the estimated 510 crew members on board.

The Moskva warship rose to fame early in the war when Ukrainian defenders of Snake Island refused calls to surrender and told the Russian ship to “go to hell”, before they were ultimately taken prisoner.