It has been three years since Willem-Alexander said sorry, so please use your trip to the Caribbean to follow his example
Dear King Charles,
You are currently on a Caribbean royal tour through the Bahamas, Guyana, and Antigua and Barbuda. I understand that during this tour you will not issue a formal apology for Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, or address the role your own family played in it. You will instead express your “sorrow”, and this will make it easier for politicians to also dodge the question. Whether that is Kemi Badenoch calling an apology a “navel-gazing distraction”, or the prime minister, Andy Burnham, saying he would support an apology, while flatly opposing reparations.
Raoul de Jong is a Dutch novelist