Kate meets Danish queen, plays with kids on Copenhagen trip

1 / 3
Britain's Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge is welcomed by Queen Margrethe II and Crown Princess Mary of Denmark during an audience at Christian IX's Palace, Copenhagen, Denmark, February 23, 2022. (Reuters)
2 / 3
Britain's Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and Denmark's Crown Princess Mary wave as they walk at the Amalienborg courtyard in Copenhagen, Denmark February 23, 2022. (Reuters)
3 / 3
Britain's Kate, Duchess of Cambridge visits the Lego Foundation PlayLab on Campus Carlsberg in Copenhagen, Tuesday, Feb. 22, 2022. (AP)
Short Url
Updated 23 February 2022
Follow

Kate meets Danish queen, plays with kids on Copenhagen trip

  • Kate slid down a slide at the Lego Foundation PlayLab and hung out with young children in the woods at a forest kindergarten
  • Royal said that Tuesday was about understanding the very earliest stages of a child’s development in Denmark

COPENHAGEN: The Duchess of Cambridge met Wednesday with Denmark’s popular monarch, Queen Margrethe, and her daughter-in-law, Crown Princess Mary, in Copenhagen as part of a two-day visit to learn more about how Denmark has led efforts in early childhood development.




Denmark's Queen Margrethe, centre and Crown Princess Mary, left, welcome Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, during her visit to Christian IX's Palace, in Copenhagen, Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022. (AP)


Kate slid down a slide at the Lego Foundation PlayLab and hung out with young children in the woods at a forest kindergarten as part of the trip with her Royal Foundation Center for Early Childhood, the first time she has taken the work of her institution to the international stage.




Britain's Kate, Duchess of Cambridge visits the Lego Foundation PlayLab on Campus Carlsberg in Copenhagen, Tuesday, Feb. 22, 2022. (AP)


Before her solo trip to Denmark, the duchess revealed she spent a recent school vacation playing with Danish-made Lego bricks with her three children — Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis — who were jealous she got to visit the Lego Foundation.
“My children are very jealous they weren’t coming to see the Lego Foundation. They were like, ‘hang on, there’s Lego and we’re not coming?’” said Kate, who arrived in the Danish capital on Tuesday and visited the Infant Mental Health Program at the University of Copenhagen.
On Twitter, the royal said that Tuesday “was all about understanding the very earliest stages of a child’s development here in Denmark.” She said that on Wednesday the focus was on children’s mental health and wellbeing.
The Duchess of Cambridge took a woodland walk with children and had a go at chopping a log while visiting a forest kindergarten in suburban Copenhagen Wednesday. She also visited the downtown Copenhagen Danner Crisis Center, a shelter that helps women exposed to domestic violence.
In 2011, Kate visited the UNICEF Supply Division Center in Copenhagen with her husband, Prince William, and the heir to the Danish throne, Crown Prince Frederik and his Australian-born wife Mary.


Ukraine sanctions Belarus leader for supporting Russian invasion

Updated 9 sec ago
Follow

Ukraine sanctions Belarus leader for supporting Russian invasion

  • Ukraine on Wednesday sanctioned Belarus’s long-time leader Alexander Lukashenko for providing material assistance to Russia in its invasion and enabling the “killing of Ukrainians.”
KYIV: Ukraine on Wednesday sanctioned Belarus’s long-time leader Alexander Lukashenko for providing material assistance to Russia in its invasion and enabling the “killing of Ukrainians.”
Lukashenko is one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest allies and allowed his country to be used as a springboard for Moscow’s February 2022 attack.
Russia has also deployed various military equipment to the country, Ukraine alleges, including relay stations that connect to Russian attack drones, fired in their hundreds every night at Ukrainian cities.
“Today Ukraine applied a package of sanctions against Alexander Lukashenko, and we will significantly intensify countermeasures against all forms of his assistance in the killing of Ukrainians,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a statement.
Russia has also said it is stationing Oreshnik missiles in Belarus, a feared hypersonic ballistic weapon that Putin has claimed is impervious to air defenses. It has twice been fired on Ukraine during the war — launched from bases in Russia — though caused minimal damage as experts said it was likely fitted with dummy warheads both times.
Zelensky also accused Lukashenko of helping Moscow avoid Western sanctions.
The measures are likely to have little practical effect, but sanctioning a head of state is a highly symbolic move.
Ukraine and several Western states sanctioned Putin at the very start of the war.
Lukashenko has at times tried to present himself as a possible intermediary between Kyiv and Moscow.
Initial talks on ending Russia’s invasion in the first days of the war were held in the country.
But Kyiv and its Western backers have largely dismissed his attempts to mediate, seeing him as little more than a mouthpiece for the Kremlin.