Omid Scobie claims Charles, Camilla and William and Kate 'declined' Lilibet ... trends now
Rpyal experts have been left confounded over the christening arrangements of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's daughter Lilibet, with a question mark over whether the baby's British relatives were invited.
Harry and Meghan's friend Omid Scobie claimed King Charles, the Queen Consort ands the Prince and Princess of Wales 'declined' an invitation to attend Lilibet's christening in California last Friday.
The Sussexes snubbed a British baptism for their youngest daughter and held a Anglican ceremony at their Montecito mansion for between 20 and 30 friends - including her billionaire godfather Tyler Perry.
Royal biographer Tom Bower said: 'My guess is that Meghan and Harry know that Charles won’t give their children princely titles and won’t help them christen Lilibet in Windsor or the Abbey (otherwise they would have waited if they came to the Coronation.
'So, they are further entrenching themselves in California. It suggests that they are not coming to the Coronation, or back to London any time soon.'
A photograph issued by Archewell of Lilibet Diana Mountbatten-Windsor, the daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, after celebrating her first birthday in June last year
Fellow royal author Phil Dampier added: 'Harry and Meghan can try and claim the moral high ground by letting it be known that they invited the King, Queen Camilla and the Prince and Princess of Wales to the christening but they are just playing games. They know there wasn’t a hope in hell of any of them going.
'If they genuinely wanted to build bridges and start a healing process why didn’t they come over with their children a couple of weeks before the Coronation and have the christening then?
'It would have been the perfect excuse to start the reconciliation process.'
Writer Richard Fitzwilliam wrote: 'The Sussexes do nothing by accident and this is also an opportunity to remind the world that they are an important part of the royal family.
'King Charles was clearly right in deciding that Archie and Lili should be given what is automatically theirs, whatever difficulties the Palace currently has with their parents.'
A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: 'It would be for The Duke and Duchess to confirm who attended their daughter’s christening.'
Scobie, who is close to the Sussexes, insisted the King, Queen consort, Prince and Princess of Wales were invited to the ceremony but chose not to attend.
It is not known whether any other Royal Family members were present, nor when the British royals were invited - or how the message was sent to the UK.
The Court Circular - Britain's official record of royal engagements - shows none of the senior royals aside from Princess Anne attended events on the day of the christening last week.
The first picture of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's daughter Lilibet was released in a Christmas card on December 23, 2021
Tyler Perry at a Los Angeles airport last Friday, on the day he attended Lilibet's christening as her godfather
Meanwhile, a statement issued by the Sussexes included a reference to their 21-month-old as 'Princess Lilibet Diana' - revealing for the first time that the couple has decided to invoke their right to use 'Princess' for Lilibet, six months since the accession to the throne of King Charles last September. Archie will be called prince.
Harry and Meghan are said to not want to deny their children the chance to inherit royal titles from their father - seeing it as their birthright - but will allow Archie and Lili the chance to decide whether to drop or keep using the royal titles when they are older.
They are understood to have been in contact with Buckingham Palace about the issue.
It comes after Meghan famously told Oprah Winfrey that Archie was not given the title of prince because of his race, but this was disputed by the palace and constitutional experts.
Lili was baptised by the Anglican Bishop of Los Angeles, John Taylor. Afterwards guests and family including Doria Ragland danced to a playlist containing songs from Harry and Meghan's wedding reception at Windsor Castle. A gospel choir also reportedly performed Oh Happy Day and This Little Light of Mine.
However, when Archie was born seventh in line to the throne to the then Queen in May 2019, he was too far down the line of succession. Rules dictate that although he was a great-grandchild of the monarch, he was not a first-born son of a future king, so was not automatically a prince.
An insider claimed that 21-month-old Lili's title of princess and Archie's title as a prince will be used in formal settings - but not in everyday conversational use by the couple.
And the monarch will not stand in their way, Buckingham Palace has revealed, adding the Royal Family's official website will now be updated to call the children Princess Lilibet and Prince Archie. It currently refers to Lilibet as 'Miss Lilibet Mountbatten-Windsor' and her brother as 'Master Archie Mountbatten-Windsor'.
Title rules set out by King George V in 1917 mean Archie and Lili, as the children of a son of a sovereign, automatically became a prince and a princess when Charles became King.
They would also be entitled to an HRH style, but although Harry and Meghan retain their HRH styles, they no longer use them after quitting the working monarchy.
It was previously reported in 2021 that Charles, in a bid to limit the number of key royals, intended, when he became monarch, to prevent Archie becoming a prince.
To do so, he would have to issue a Letters Patent amending Archie's right to be a prince and Lili's right to be a princess.
Harry, who stepped down as a senior working royal in 2020 for a new life in the US, criticised his father's parenting in his controversial autobiography Spare, accused the Prince of Wales of physically
