LONDON: Britain’s Prince William and his wife Kate on Friday registered the birth of their son George, who was born on July 22 in a blaze of global publicity and is third in line to the British throne.
Known officially as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, the new parents completed the bureaucratic step at Kensington Palace, their London residence, the palace said in a statement.
Under the law, all births in England must be registered within 42 days of the child being born.
Prince William signed the birth register, witnessed by a registrar from Westminster Register Office.
The palace released a photograph of the infant prince’s birth certificate, which mixed the mundane and the monarchic.
Hand-written on the same sober form used to register the births of ordinary British babies, the document is entitled “Birth” and the entry number on the register is 207.
The names and occupations entered on the form are anything but ordinary, however.
The baby’s name is recorded as His Royal Highness Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge.
The parents’ names are recorded as His Royal Highness Prince William Arthur Philip Louis Duke of Cambridge and Catherine Elizabeth Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambridge. The father’s occupation is “prince of the United Kingdom” while the mother’s is “princess of the United Kingdom.”
Prince William is a Royal Air Force search and rescue helicopter pilot, but the form makes no mention of that.
Kate and William register birth of Prince George
Kate and William register birth of Prince George
France returns colonial-era ‘talking drum’ to Ivory Coast
- The drum is to be exhibited permanently in a new museum being built in Ivory Coast’s commercial capital Abidjan
PARIS: France on Friday handed over a “talking drum” looted by colonial troops from Ivory Coast in 1916 in the latest repatriation of stolen artefacts.
The Djidji Ayokwe drum, more than three meters (10 feet) long and weighing 430 kilos (950 pounds) was used by the Ebrie tribe to transmit messages.
It is one of hundreds of objects France is preparing to send back to Africa, with the efforts set to be accelerated by the passing of a new law to authorize mass repatriations.
“All of Ivory Coast is ready to welcome it,” Ivory Coast Culture Minister Francoise Remarck said at a ceremony in Paris with her French counterpart Rachida Dati.
Remarck added that she was “extremely moved” by the “return of this symbol” that is “finally coming back to its homeland.”
The drum is to be exhibited permanently in a new museum being built in Ivory Coast’s commercial capital Abidjan.
France has been flooded with restitution demands from former colonies such as Algeria, Mali and Benin.
Its national museums hold tens of thousands of artworks and other prized artefacts that were seized or purchased during the colonial era.
European nations are slowly moving to return a limited number of looted artefacts in a bid to build bridges with their former colonies.
