After Attack on Royal Limo, Questions and Reproach
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LONDON -- The British police promised an investigation into the attack on a limousine carrying Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, while security experts and the news media raised questions Friday about how the royal couple were placed into the potentially dangerous situation.
Dozens of protesters broke through a cordon of police motorcycles on Thursday to smash and deface the Rolls-Royce Phantom VI that was carrying the prince and his wife. The demonstrators dented a rear panel, splattered the glossy dark brown exterior with white paint, pelted the car with sticks and bottles, and smashed a side window. Some yelled, "Off with their heads!"
Photographs splashed across the front pages of newspapers on Friday showed the couple, who were on their way to a royal gala, in the back seat wearing formal attire, mouths agape, as the car crawled through the theater district in London.
The public initially was sympathetic to the trapped and terrified couple. But by Friday, the reaction had turned into criticism and recriminations, with questions raised about why the couple were not riding in an armored car, why they took the route they did and why, once crowds of angry youths were visible, they kept to their route.
"Prince Charles and Camilla's Rolls-Royce was wrong car," declared a headline in The Telegraph. "Could Charles and Camilla have been better protected?" asked a headline on the Web site of the BBC.
The police focused on the protesters, thousands of whom were demonstrating against a sharp increase in college tuition fees. More than 50 people were injured, according to news reports, and 33 protesters were arrested, the police said.
The Metropolitan Police force said Friday that it had opened a "major investigation" into the attack and into "all of the circumstances behind the violent disorder." Prime Minister David Cameron said he wanted to make sure "the people who behaved in these appalling ways feel the full force of the law of the land."
First Published December 10, 2010 11:50 pm
