Estonia's president to attend King Charles III coronation
President Alar Karis is to attend Saturday's coronation of King Charles III of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.
The Estonian president will join around 100 heads of state for the event, taking place at Westminster Abbey.
President's office spokesperson Mariann Sudakov told ERR's Russian-language news that: "The President received an invite to attend the coronation ceremony of King Charles III."
"The president will travel to London on Friday, together with the first lady, Sirje Karis," she added.
The coronation is to be broadcast by ETV and by ETV+, the latter ERR's Russian-language TV channel, from 12.00 p.m. Estonian time on Saturday, May 6.
Camilla, Queen Consort, will also be crowned at Saturday's ceremony.
Since there is no period of interregnum with British monarchs, Charles as heir automatically became King upon the passing of his mother, Elizabeth II, on September 8 last year. Her coronation, in 1953, had been one of the first mass televised events in Britain.
Scotland's Stone of Scone is being transported South for Saturday's coronation. The stone, sequestered in 1296 by Edward I of England, was returned to Scotland on the 700th anniversary of that event, after an unofficial attempt to repatriate it in the 1950s. It had been retained in London in the intervening time.
Charles is the third king to carry that regal name. Charles I was beheaded in 1649 after holding out against the institution of a constitutional monarchy, despite several years' civil war whose complex causes in part related to that issue. His son, Charles II, was restored as monarch in 1660, but left no legitimate issue. It was the deposition of Charles II's successor and younger brother, James II, which eventually led to the imposition of a constitutional monarchy in the United Kingdom, from 1688 onward.
Saturday's coronation will contain several departures from tradition, including an unprecedented oath of allegiance which those who see themselves as the king's subjects are invited to take, as well as a broadening of the faith aspect of the ceremony, to the extent that the publication of the corresponding liturgy was delayed.
As Prince of Wales, Charles last visited Estonia back in 2001, while most senior members of Britain's royal family have been on official visits since then, most recently Anne, Princess Royal, earlier this year.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Sergei Mihhailov
Source: ERR Novosti
