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By ROD McGUIRK Associated Press
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — King Charles III and Queen Camilla arrived in Sydney on Friday for the first Australian visit by a reigning monarch in more than a decade, a trip that has restarted debate about the nation’s constitutional links to Britain.
The Sydney Opera House’s iconic sails were illuminated with images of previous royal visits to welcome the couple, whose six-day trip will be brief by royal standards. Charles, 75, is being treated for cancer, which led to the reduced itinerary.
Charles and Camilla were welcomed in light rain at Sydney Airport by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, New South Wales state Premier Chris Minns and the king’s representative in Australia, Governor-General Sam Mostyln.
Charles is only the second reigning British monarch to visit Australia. His mother, Queen Elizabeth II, became the first 70 years ago.
While the welcome has been warm, Australia’s national and state leaders want the royals removed from their constitution.
Monarchists expect the visit will strengthen Australians’ connection to their sovereign. Opponents hope for a rejection of the concept that someone from the other side of the world is Australia’s head of state.
The Australian Republic Movement, which campaigns for an Australian citizen to replace the British monarch as head of state, likens the royal visit to a touring act in the entertainment industry.
ARM co-chair Esther Anatolitis said royal visits to Australia were “something of a show that comes to town.”
“Unfortunately, it is a reminder that Australia’s head of state isn’t full-time, isn’t Australian. It’s a part-time person based overseas who’s the head of state of numerous places,” Anatolitis told the AP.
“We say to Charles and Camilla: ‘Welcome, we hope you’re enjoying our country and good health and good spirits.’ But we also look forward to this being the final tour of a sitting Australian monarch and that when they come back to visit soon, we look forward to welcoming them as visiting dignitaries,” she added.
Philip Benwell, national chair of the Australian Monarchist League, which campaigns for Australia’s constitutional links to Britain to be maintained, expects reaction to the royal couple will be overwhelmingly positive.
“Something like the royal visit brings the king closer in the minds of people, because we have an absent monarchy,” Benwell told the AP.
Benwell is critical of the premiers of all six states, who have declined invitations to attend a reception for Charles in the national capital Canberra due to prioir engagements.
“It would be virtually incumbent upon the premiers to be in Canberra to meet him and pay their respects,” Benwell said. “This is the first visit of a king ever to Australia.”
Charles was drawn into Australia’s republic debate months before his visit.
The Australian Republic Movement wrote to Charles in December last year requesting a meeting in Australia and for the king to advocate their cause. Buckingham Palace politely wrote back in March to say the king’s meetings would be decided upon by the Australian government. A meeting with the ARM does not appear on the official itinerary.
“Whether Australia becomes a republic is … a matter for the Australian public to decide,” said the letter from Buckingham Palace.
Australians decided in a referendum in 1999 to retain Queen Elizabeth II as head of state. That result is widely regarded as a consequence of disagreement about how a president should be chosen rather than majority support for a monarch.
When his mother made the last of her 16 journeys to Australia in 2011 at the age of 85, she visited Canberra, Brisbane and Melbourne on the east coast before opening the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in the west coast city of Perth.
Elizabeth’s first Australian tour at the age of 27 took in scores of far-flung Outback towns; an estimated 75% of the nation’s population came to see her.