Prince Harry received a warm reception after landing in Angola to raise awareness of uncleared explosive landmines left behind by a devastating civil war.
The royal, who made the trip to the African state without his wife, Meghan, is set to walk across a landmine field just as his late mother, Princess Diana, did 28 years ago for the Halo Trust, for which Harry serves as patron.
Harry is understood to have travelled solo without the Duchess of Sussex, after deciding it was too dangerous for her to join him.
A source said: ‘The duke won’t let his wife go to England over security concerns, so there was no chance he’d allow her to go to Angola to walk across landmines.’
After landing at Luanda airport earlier this evening, the royal was seen shaking hands with President Lourenço and sitting with other dignitaries to discuss the continuation of demining efforts.
Angola is in southwestern Africa, along the Atlantic coast. It was ravaged by a brutal 27-year civil war until 2002 and the country is still grappling with the legacy of landmines, with millions buried across the countryside.
As part of its mission to create a ‘mine-free country’, Halo has cleared more than 123,000 landmines since 1994 and works to transform former war zones into farmland, national parks and ‘safe’ villages.
In 2019, when Harry came on board as Halo’s patron, the Angolan government pledged £46million to create wildlife corridors and protect endangered species in conservation areas.
Prince Harry received a warm reception after landing in Angola to raise awareness of uncleared explosive landmines left behind by a devastating civil war
The royal was seen shaking hands with President Lourenço to discuss the continuation of demining efforts
As part of its mission to create a ‘mine-free country’, Halo has cleared more than 123,000 landmines since 1994
It set a target of clearing all landmines by 2025 and Harry is said to hope that his presence there will boost efforts to meet the target.
He is hoping the publicity surrounding his visit will encourage more donations from the Angolan government.
A source involved in organising the event told the MailOnline: ‘Usually these trips help to drive a bit more money from the government.’
The duke has returned to the country for the first time since 2019, when he was still a working member of the royal family.
It is understood that he take a series of small two-person planes to the site of the mines he intends to walk across.
Harry is hoping to recreate the iconic images his mother, the late Princess Diana, created in 1997 when she took a walk through a minefield wearing a Halo Trust flak jacket and helmet.
The striking photographs went down in history, particularly as she died later that year in a car crash.
But it is not a sight likely to be recreated by Harry’s wife Meghan.
It is believed Prince Harry hopes the publicity surrounding his visit will encourage more donations from the Angolan government
Harry is hoping to recreate the iconic images his mother, the late Princess Diana, created in 1997 when she took a walk through a minefield wearing a Halo Trust flak jacket and helmet
Sources on the ground say that as well as being wary of the dangers for her, the Duke of Sussex is keen to keep his work with Halo close to his chest.
A source added: ‘Halo is really his thing, it means so much to him to be patron and he just wants to keep his work with them to himself.’
Prince Harry is hoping to draw publicity away from the drama surrounding his feud with the Royal family and towards Halo’s groundbreaking use of AI and drone technology to speed up clearance.
It is thought a speech is planned for later today – but Halo, with Harry’s blessing, has banned any British press from attending the event.
Nevertheless, the trip will not fail to garner worldwide headlines.
This is the latest of several significant visits Harry has made to Angola in recent years.
In September 2019, after he became patron, he retraced the exact steps his mother took near Huambo, causing a sensation across the globe.
The duke also visited the remote Dirico region, where he toured a newly cleared minefield, a detonated a landmine, and spent a night camping by the Cuito River.
Prince Harry with a deminer from the Halo Trust in 2010
He then visited the town’s Princess Diana Orthopaedic Centre, met female deminers, and toured a demining camp in southeastern Angola.
In September 2024, he joined Angola’s foreign minister at a United Nations Halo event in New York. Again, Meghan steered clear of the event despite the fact it was in the US.
Sources at the time said she did not attend because the trip was part of his ‘independent schedule’ during Climate Week.
The trip comes in the wake of a secret peace summit held between Harry’s two most senior aides and King Charles’s head of communications in central London last week.
The meeting has been described as a charm offensive by the Sussexes to turn around their negative public image.
Harry and Meghan’s new chief of communications, Meredith Maines, met with Tobyn Andreae, the King’s communications secretary, at the Royal Over-Seas League a three-minute walk from Clarence House, the monarch’s London residence, on Wednesday.
Also present was Liam Maguire, who runs the Sussexes’ PR team in the UK. Images of the rendezvous raised hopes of a reconciliation between Harry, 40, and his father, 76.
The meeting, held at a private members club in London, was the first step in a ‘rapprochement process’ to restore the broken relationship between the duke, his wife Meghan and the rest of the royal family.
Prince Harry is not joined by his wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, after he decided it was too dangerous for her to join him
While royal experts have claimed a wounded Prince William will feel less inclined to resolve the feud than his father King Charles, they added the monarch would have undoubtedly consulted the heir to the throne before conducting any peace talks with Harry’s aides.
Royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams told MailOnline: ‘The King and Harry are currently, we understood from Harry’s interview on the BBC, not speaking. This meeting obviously is a sign things are moving forward.
‘The King would never have made these moves without William’s support and understanding.
‘William and Catherine are the future of the monarchy.
‘He has undoubtedly been furious at the way the Sussexes have behaved and undoubtedly regards Harry’s behaviour as treason of a sort.
‘They reportedly have not spoken in over two years.’
He added: ‘Ideally, the Sussexes might like to drive a wedge between the King and the heir to the throne. They won’t succeed.’
