The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will attend the Invictus Games opening ceremony in Vancouver on February 8 in a joint appearance, according to a well-placed source.
What was originally planned as a solo trip for Prince Harry, 40, will now be a joint engagement, and this shift reflects their renewed focus on collaboration in public engagements.
The opening ceremony will see singer Katy Perry perform, Grammy-nominated Noah Kahan, and Canadian singer Nelly Furtado.
“It was important for the Sussexes to appear together at such a worthwhile event,” the source told Express.co.uk. “The Invictus Games is a Sussex initiative and something they want their children to continue once they get older.”
The source claims the Duchess of Sussex, 43, decided to join her husband after PR firm Three Gate Strategies took over the couple’s communications earlier this month with a new direction.
Led by the couple’s former Head of Communications Ashley Hansen, the communications agency will push for a renewed focus on joint appearances and initiatives following months of solo engagements.
The source said: “There will be a renewed focus on the Sussexes as a couple, as a brand and showcasing them as a couple and family.”
The Invictus Games was founded in 2014 by the Duke of Sussex, Prince Harry, after visiting the Warrior Games in Colorado a year earlier and seeing its impact on injured US military personnel.
This year’s Games will feature winter sports for the first time and run from February 8 to 16 in Canada.
The Invictus Games are an international platform for veterans to showcase their physical and mental rehabilitation. The games celebrate the fighting spirit of veterans and demonstrate the sacrifices they have made.
The competition has previously been held in London (2014), Orlando, Florida (2016), Toronto, Canada (2017), Sydney, Australia (2018), The Hague, the Netherlands (2022, bumped from 2020 amid the COVID pandemic) and Dusseldorf, Germany (2023), with the seventh edition happening in Vancouver and Whistler.
A year ago in February 2024, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle launched the countdown by attending the Invictus Games One Year to Go celebrations in Canada, spending time at the kickoff Winter Training Camp with athletes.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.express.co.uk ’
