President Higgins to meet Prince Charles on three-day trip to Britain

Visit to begin in Birmingham and then continue to Liverpool

President Michael D Higgins. File photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill
President Michael D Higgins. File photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill

President Michael D Higgins and his wife Sabina will begin a three-day visit to the UK on Monday.

Mr Higgins will begin his visit in Birmingham and then travel to Liverpool, where is expected to meet the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall.

This will be the first official visit by President Higgins to Birmingham and his third official visit to Liverpool.

The President is due to meet the Lord Mayor of Birmingham and attend a civic reception hosted by Birmingham City Council on Monday.

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He will also visit the Birmingham Irish Association and Birmingham Bombings Memorial, which commemorates 21 people who were killed in the pub bombing of November 1974.

President Higgins and Sabina are due to be greeted by the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall at the University of Liverpool on Tuesday morning.

They will later attend an Enterprise Ireland and IDA business lunch as well as meeting the Mayor of Liverpool and visit the Liverpool Irish Centre and Liverpool World Museum.

The visit will conclude on Wednesday after a stop-off at the Liverpool Central Library.

In a speech during President Higgins’ visit to Liverpool in 2012, he said “for centuries past, Liverpool has represented the first glimpse of Britain for generations of Irish migrants and travellers”.

"The mighty docks of Liverpool represented a gateway; the mouth of the Mersey became a point of transition to a new life, much as Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty were for those men and women who travelled west, to New York and beyond," he said.

Sarah Burns

Sarah Burns

Sarah Burns is a reporter for The Irish Times