King Charles was welcomed at a lavish state banquet at the Palace of Versailles on Wednesday night, at the start of a state visit to reinforce the renewed UK-France relationship after the near total collapse in trust during the Boris Johnson years after Brexit.
In Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors, the famed 17th-century gallery built by the Louis XIV to project the power and majesty of the French monarchy, King Charles told the French president, Emmanuel Macron: “Your generosity of spirit brings to mind how my family and I were so greatly moved by the tributes paid in France to my mother, the late queen … You said that she had touched your hearts – and it was she who held France in the greatest affection.”
