Prince Harry, 40, has voiced deep concern over the safety of his wife Meghan Markle, their two children, and himself when in the United Kingdom, following the rejection of his appeal to restore state-funded security.
On May 2, 2025, his legal efforts came to an end when Judge Sir Geoffrey Vos, along with two other judges, denied his request for a review of the decision to remove his police protection.
Harry’s security arrangements were downgraded in 2020 after he stepped back from his official royal duties. Since then, he has consistently warned of the risks he and his family face without formal protection while visiting the U.K.
He has drawn connections between those concerns and the tragic death of his mother, Princess Diana, who died in a car crash in Paris in 1997. At the time, Diana had opted out of royal police protection following her divorce from Prince Charles and was being chased by paparazzi while under private security.
Since the beginning of his relationship with Meghan, Harry has voiced fears that his family could fall victim to a similar fate. In the docuseries The Me You Can’t See, he opened up about those regrets.
“Do I have any regrets? Yeah. My biggest regret is not making more of a stance earlier on in my relationship with my wife and calling out the racism when I did,” he said.
Following the court’s decision, Prince Harry spoke to the BBC, expressing that he, Meghan, and their children — Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet — would not be adequately safeguarded in the U.K.
He also spoke candidly about the deeper family tensions behind the situation:
“At the heart of it, this is a family dispute, and it makes me really, really sad that we are sitting here today, five years later, where a decision was made – most likely, in fact, I know – to keep us under the roof,” he said.
He went on to say:
“But then once they realized that wasn’t going to work, once they realized that myself, my wife, my kids are happier outside of the institution, then please just look at the facts.”
Prince Harry also suggested who bears responsibility for the risks facing his family:
“Look at the risk, look at the threat, look at the impact that if anything was to happen to me, my wife, or my father’s grandchildren. If anything was to happen to them, look where the responsibility lies,” he said.
Beyond the personal, Harry raised concerns about the broader moral obligation of those in charge:
“Whether we agree or disagree – there’s a lot that we agree on, there’s a lot that we disagree on – that aside, where is the duty of care?”
He added, “As I said, life is precious, and it is very clear that from 2020, because I was no longer allowed an official role and because I decided to remove myself from the institution, that my life got devalued from the highest score to the lowest score overnight.”
Harry stressed that his ultimate concern is to prevent a repetition of the past:
“I don’t want history to repeat itself,” he said. “I think there’s a lot of other people out there, the majority, that also don’t want history to repeat itself. Through the disclosure process, I’ve discovered that some people want history to repeat itself, which is pretty dark.”
In a formal statement released on May 2, 2025, Harry again referenced the fate of Princess Diana:
“This all comes from the same institutions that preyed upon my mother, that openly campaigned for the removal of our security, and that continue to incite hatred towards me, my wife and even our children. … I can’t see a world in which I would be bringing my wife and children back to the U.K. at this point.”