Kensington Palace has shared an apology printed by The Sun newspaper over a false story which claimed Prince Harry had criticised investigations into historic military abuse in Iraq.
The Palace on Monday said it acknowledged the paper’s retraction in a tweet sent to its 822,000 followers.
The Sun’s piece, which ran on the paper’s front page under the headline: “Harry: Heroes Probes ‘A Joke’”, said the Prince had blasted so-called iHat investigations into alleged abuse in Iraq.
The paper said a “furious” Harry had “hit out” at the treatment of troops accused of war crimes.
But now The Sun has accepted the story was untrue.
In its apology, The Sun wrote:
We published a front page story on 17th October, 2016 headed “Harry: Heroes Probes a Joke” stating that Prince Harry described iHat investigations and prosecutions as ‘a joke’, despite categorical denials as to its truth from a Kensington Palace spokesman before publication.
We now accept that the story was untrue and that we were misinformed by our source.
We apologise to Prince Harry and his staff.
At the time, the Palace issued a statement criticising the story, writing: “[Prince Harry] has not expressed views on this topic to anyone and he does not believe it would have been appropriate for a member of The Royal Family to have done so.
“This was very clearly communicated to The Sun prior to publication.”
The sharing of the apology echoes a strengthened approach to media relations from Prince Harry’s team.
Last year, Prince Harry criticised press intrusion and media coverage in reference to his relationship with US actor Meghan Markle.