Princess Anne: Queen Elizabeth II’s loyal daughter

AFP | by Robin MILLARD

Queen Elizabeth II’s only daughter Princess Anne rarely lets her emotions show but the grief was etched on her face as she accompanied her mother’s coffin.

With her elder brother King Charles III called away to duty, the queen’s second child accompanied their mother’s coffin on its journey through Scotland and back to London.

Anne, 72, was with Queen Elizabeth on Thursday when she passed away aged 96 after seven decades on the throne.

“I was fortunate to share the last 24 hours of my dearest mother’s life,” Anne said in a statement Tuesday.

“It has been an honour and a privilege to accompany her on her final journeys. Witnessing the love and respect shown by so many on these journeys has been both humbling and uplifting.

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“To my mother, The Queen, thank you.”

Anne travelled with the cortege on the six-hour drive from Balmoral to Edinburgh on Sunday.

She curtseyed as soldiers carried the casket into the monarch’s official Scottish residence, the Palace of Holyroodhouse.

Anne stood guard at the coffin alongside her siblings at St Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh on Monday.

And the princess flew with the casket from the Scottish capital to London on Tuesday.

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Anne’s role may now change depending on whether Charles, 73, pursues a slimmed-down monarchy. But he may find his closest sibling a rock of support as he adjusts to his new role.

Anne said she was “grateful for the support and understanding offered to my dear brother Charles as he accepts the added responsibilities of the monarch”.

Learning the hard way

Anne has earned a reputation as the hardest-working royal, squeezing in a career as an Olympic horse rider alongside a lifetime of public engagements.

Cast much in the same plain-speaking mould as her late father Prince Philip, Anne is reported to have once described herself as “not everyone’s idea of a fairy-tale princess”.

“You learn the hard way,” she said. “There isn’t a school for royalty.”

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She never sought to please the press, saying she did not “do stunts” and once told photographers to “naff off”.

In 1974, she was the target of a kidnap attempt when her car was ambushed. Two police officers, her chauffeur and a passer-by were shot and wounded.

An account released by the National Archives said assailant Ian Ball pointed his gun at Anne and said: “I want you to come with me for a day or two, because I want £2 million.

“Will you get out of the car?”

The princess replied curtly: “Not bloody likely — and I haven’t got £2 million.”

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Anne stuck to a mixture of classic chic and casual, keeping her voluminous, up-do hair style throughout her adult life.

She adopted a business-like demeanour that sometimes meant she came across as frosty, and resulted in her sharp, dry sense of humour often being mistaken.

Gifted horse rider

Born on August 15, 1950, Anne was taught at Buckingham Palace before beginning boarding school in 1963.

She inherited her mother’s passion for horses and the young princess became a skilled equestrian.

Anne won the 1971 European Eventing Championship and the British public voted her that year’s BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

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“I certainly saw it as a way of proving that you had something that was not dependent on your family and it was down to you to succeed or fail,” she said of her horse riding career.

She married equestrian Mark Phillips in 1972. The wedding was an international event watched by an estimated 500 million people.

Anne represented Britain at the Montreal 1976 Olympics, returning without a medal after a particularly nasty fall.

She became a member of the International Olympic Committee in 1988 and was on the organising committee for the London 2012 Games.

Anne and her army officer first husband had two children — sports events managing director Peter and 2006 eventing world champion Zara.

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Breaking with tradition, the couple decided Phillips should not accept a title so their children would be free to determine their own lives.

Divorce and remarriage

Anne was granted the title of Princess Royal, traditionally given to the monarch’s eldest daughter, in 1987.

She split from Phillips in 1989 and the couple divorced in 1992.

Nine months later, Anne married naval commander Timothy Laurence, a former equerry to Queen Elizabeth.

Anne supports more than 300 charities, organisations and military regiments, including an association with Save the Children that has lasted more than 50 years.

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She regularly tops the charts for conducting the most royal engagements, and writes her own speeches.

Peruvian presidential candidate Napoleón Becerra dies in campaign road accident

Presidential candidate Napoleón Becerra, representing the Partido de los Trabajadores y Emprendedores (PTE) in Peru, died in a traffic accident while traveling to a campaign event, local authorities confirmed Sunday.

Becerra, who also served as president of the centrist political party, ranked among the lowest in opinion polls in a crowded field of more than 30 candidates competing in the presidential election scheduled for April 12.

Recent surveys place Rafael López Aliaga at the top of voter preferences.

The accident occurred near the town of Ayacucho, in southern Peru, when the vehicle carrying the candidate overturned for reasons that remain under investigation.

“The candidate Becerra has died,” Balvin Huamani, mayor of the district of Pilpichaca, told RPP radio.

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According to Huamani, he personally transported the 61-year-old candidate to a local health center, where doctors confirmed his death.

The Jurado Nacional de Elecciones (JNE) expressed condolences over Becerra’s passing and wished a speedy recovery to the three people who were traveling with him and were injured in the crash.

International

Noboa intensifies anti-cartel crackdown as violence persists in Ecuador

A close ally of Washington, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa has pursued a hardline security strategy against cocaine cartels for more than two years, yet homicide, disappearance and extortion rates remain high across the country.

Between Sunday night and the morning of March 31, Ecuador’s armed forces will launch a “very strong offensive” with “advisory support” from the United States, Interior Minister John Reimberg announced Tuesday.

The government has kept details of the operation confidential and has not confirmed whether U.S. troops will be deployed on Ecuadorian soil, as has occurred at times during Noboa’s administration.

As part of the security measures, residents in the coastal provinces of Guayas, Los Ríos, Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, and El Oro will be subject to a nightly curfew from 11:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. local time for the next two weeks.

“We are in a war,” Reimberg said, urging citizens to remain indoors. “Do not take risks. Stay home and allow the security forces and our allies to do the work that must be done.”

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Although Ecuador does not produce cocaine, it has become a major departure point for drugs heading to the United States. Meanwhile, the violence associated with trafficking has increasingly affected the local population.

Bordering the world’s largest cocaine producers, Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has gone from being considered a relatively peaceful country to recording one of the highest homicide rates in Latin America—52 killings per 100,000 inhabitants—according to the **Observatory of Organized Crime.

International

Peruvian presidential candidate proposes death penalty amid crime surge

Peru is facing an unprecedented surge in crime ahead of its presidential election scheduled for April 12, with violence fueled by extortion networks and a wave of contract killings linked to organized crime.

Police data show that 2,200 homicides tied to organized crime were recorded in 2025, while extortion complaints increased by 19%, underscoring the growing security crisis in the South American nation.

Amid this backdrop, presidential candidate Álvarez has proposed reinstating the death penalty if elected, arguing that extreme measures are needed to curb the violence.

To implement the proposal, Álvarez said Peru would withdraw from the American Convention on Human Rights—also known as the Pact of San José—which the country signed in 1978. The agreement prevents member states that have abolished capital punishment from reinstating it.

Currently, Peruvian law only allows the death penalty in cases of treason during wartime.

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“We have to leave the Pact of San José and apply the death penalty in Peru because those miserable criminals don’t deserve to live,” Álvarez told AFP during a campaign stop at a market in Callao, the port city neighboring Lima.

“An iron fist against those criminals,” he added, proposing to declare hitmen as military targets.

During the campaign event, Álvarez walked through stalls selling vegetables, groceries, and fish, greeting vendors while musicians played cumbia music nearby.

The 62-year-old candidate, who spent more than four decades working in television as a comedian, is a newcomer to politics and is running for president under the País para Todos party.

Polls place him fifth in voter preference with nearly 4% support in a fragmented race featuring 36 candidates.