By royal biographer Emily Andrews
‘SOPHIE IS THE DEFINITION OF DUTIFUL’
Inevitably, since the death of Queen Elizabeth and the illnesses of the King and Princess of Wales, the spotlight has fallen on other members of the Royal Family. None more so than the Duchess of Edinburgh.
Sophie has always been a hard worker, a stalwart of The Firm and charming besides. So it’s been great to see some of the important work she does, which previously has been lost in the Megxit furore, recognised and highlighted.
A case in point was her recent visit to Ukraine to show her solidarity with the men, women and children affected by the war since Russia invaded two years ago. The British government asked her to go, and she delivered a message on behalf of the King, in her meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Olena Zelenska, Ukraine’s president and first lady.
Sophie has been a vocal champion of conflict-related sexual abuse victims and has travelled around the world to raise awareness of rape and sexual violence. She has visited several countries over the years to highlight the impact of historical and ongoing conflict, including Kosovo, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Colombia, and has heard first-hand testimonies from survivors of conflict-related sexual violence.
Speaking at the UK ambassador’s reception in Ukraine, she thanked the survivors she had met for their honesty and said she had travelled to many countries in conflict or post-conflict, where ‘women and girls pay the highest price in terms of human costs’.
The duchess added, ‘Rape is used to demean, to degrade and to destroy. And we have to get better at trying to prevent that from happening. Where we cannot prevent it from happening, what we must do is put measures in place to support those who have fallen victim to such crimes.’
I remember joining Sophie on an engagement at Buckingham Palace with Queen Elizabeth to celebrate the work of the Diamond Jubilee Trust in rolling out vital eye care across the Commonwealth. Sophie had been personally involved in many of the initiatives, inspired by her own experience with her daughter Lady Louise’s eye problems, and was delighted to gather many of those people in the picture galleries at BP.
She (and the late Queen) posed for so many pictures, gave a fantastic spe
