Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the EU, will have tea with King Charles at Windsor Castle after she meets with Rishi Sunak to discuss a Northern Ireland Brexit deal.
According to Buckingham Palace, the conference was planned on the recommendation of the executive branch.
The choice was “fundamentally” up to the King, according to Number 10.
Nonetheless, there have been cautions against involving the monarch in a divisive political controversy.
Brexit supporter and current Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg argued that it was “constitutionally unwise to involve the King in a matter of immediate political controversy.”
Sammy Wilson, the Democratic Unionist Party’s top whip, claimed that the gathering ran the possibility of “dragging the King into a tremendously contentious political issue.”
Yet, the King’s most recent encounters with foreign leaders, including the presidents of Poland and Ukraine, were compared by the prime minister’s official spokeswoman to the gathering with Ms. von der Leyen.
“It’s for the King to make those decisions,” said the Number 10 spokesman.
“The King is pleased to meet any world leader if they are visiting Britain and it is the government’s advice that he should do so,” said a palace spokesman.
Before to the meeting, a senior government source informed the BBC that a fresh Brexit agreement for Northern Ireland had been struck at around 14:20 GMT.
The EU attempted to set the Windsor meeting apart from political negotiations by claiming that it was “independent” and “not part” of the discussions regarding the Northern Ireland protocol.
According to sources at Buckingham Palace, the meeting between the King and the visiting world leader was routine and would build on the Monarch’s past encounters with Ms. von der Leyen.
There will be tea served and photos taken at the meeting at Windsor Castle, which was characterised in terms of a larger agenda that included discussions about climate change and Ukraine.
