STOCKHOLM, Sweden — Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II introduced Sunday that she plans to abdicate after 52 years and hand over the throne to her son, Crown Prince Frederik.
The queen, who’s Europe’s longest-reigning residing monarch, introduced throughout her New Year’s speech that she would step down on Jan. 14th, which is the anniversary of her personal accession to the throne at age 31 following the demise of her father, King Frederik IX.
Margrethe, 83, mentioned the again surgical procedure she underwent in early 2023 led to “thoughts about the future” and when to move on the tasks of the crown to her son. “I have decided that now is the right time,” she mentioned in her speech.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen paid tribute to her in an announcement, providing a “heartfelt thank you to Her Majesty the Queen for her lifelong dedication and tireless efforts for the Kingdom.”
Margrethe is the “epitome of Denmark” Frederiksen’s assertion learn, and “throughout the years has put words and feelings into who we are as a people and as a nation.”
The 6-foot-tall, chain-smoking Margrethe has been some of the in style public figures in Denmark, the place the monarch’s position is basically ceremonial. She typically walked the streets of Copenhagen just about unescorted and received the admiration of Danes for her heat manners and for her abilities as a linguist and designer.
A eager skier, she was a member of a Danish ladies’s air pressure unit as a princess, collaborating in judo programs and endurance checks within the snow. Margrethe remained powerful at the same time as she grew older. In 2011, at age 70, she visited Danish troops in southern Afghanistan carrying a army jumpsuit.
As monarch, she crisscrossed the nation and recurrently visited Greenland and the Faeroe Islands, the 2 semi-independent territories that are a part of the Danish Realm, and was met in every single place by cheering crowds.
Denmark has Europe’s oldest ruling monarchy, which traces its line again to the Viking king Gorm the Old, who died in 958. Although Magrethe is head of state, the Danish Constitution strictly dominated out her involvement in social gathering politics.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”