Harry and Meghan start second day of engagements in Colombia

Prince Harry and Meghan resumed their ‘quasi-royal’ tour of Colombia today with a visit to a school in one of the capital’s rundown districts surrounded by a ring of steel.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex were escorted to a school in the Santa Fe area of Bogota amid tight security with at least 16 armoured police vehicles, as well as armed officers and soldiers, seen on patrol before their arrival.

Roads were blocked off as the couple’s convoy swept into the area, which is described as a no-go zone in the Colombian capital – when MailOnline asked for a taxi to take our reporter there he questioned if we had the right place.

The visit to the school, which is overlooked by rundown apartment blocks and several rundown favelas which cling to the nearby hillsides, comes despite Harry’s raising concerns over his security arrangements when visiting the UK.

After being greeted by the school’s headmaster Serafin Ordoñez, the Duke and Duchess, along with the country’s Vice President Francia Marquez, took part in a brief tour.

It saw the couple observe an art session, visit a kindergarten class and get their hands dirty by helping the young students plant trees in the school’s garden.

Later in the day the couple will have a private lunch with vice president Francia Marquez before meeting with members of Colombia’s Invictus Games squad, who are gearing up for the 2025 games in Whistler, Canada.

Officials have kept the itinerary a closely guarded secret because parts of the country are described as ‘best avoided’ due to ongoing internal conflicts.

Colombia, like Nigeria where the couple visited in May, is seen as a high risk destination in parts by UK and US officials.

Prince Harry and Meghan’s security in Colombia also includes an officer armed with a Kevlar shield to stop any potential shooter taking aim at the couple.

At each event the couple have attended the man – part of the local security detail – has been seen jumping out of a vehicle head of the couple holding the folding shield.

During the Duke and Duchess visit to La Giralda school on Friday morning the shelf was clearly visible behind Harry as he planted a tree in the grounds and on footage released by the Colombian government.

The shield – known as a ballistic briefcase – is also being used to protect the country’s vice president Francia Marquez who is hosting the visit and who has been the target of several assassination attempts.

Their first visit today was to La Giralda school in Santa Fe, which was nominated for being one of the top ten in the world, not for its education record instead its promotion of a healthy living and lifestyle for students and teachers.

After being greeted by the school’s headmaster Serafin Ordóñez, the Duke and Duchess along with the Vice President participated in a brief tour of the school including participating in an art session, visiting a kindergarten class, and also joining in on planting trees on the school’s property.

Meghan helped a five-year-old pupil called Manuela plant a walnut tree while Harry helped out with a guayacan tree – a plant native to South America.

The entire school prepared special moments for the Duke and Duchess’s arrival, including performances all throughout the grounds where students wore traditional Colombian dress and performed songs along with live music.

Pupils also presented presents for Harry and Meghan’s children Archie, five, and Lilibet, three, including Colombian style ponchos, as well as personal letters and drawings.

School CEO Diana Basto said:’ It was so special for us to have Harry and Meghan come and visit us and the staff and children were all very excited. It was a lovely experience to have them here.

‘They visited various parts of the school including the memorial museum section where they learned about people who have been killed in previous conflicts in Colombia’s history.

‘It was emotional for them and from their to the kindergarten and then finally onto the garden where they helped plant two trees.

‘There was music and dancing as they went around the school and they joined in with the dancing. Then Harry had a go at the punching bag in the gym.

‘They were super excited when they were given the presents and because the children in the kindergarten are the same age as Archie. ‘

The first stop inside was to look at the school’s historical memory museum where students share art they’ve created commemorating those killed in past Colombian conflicts.

The students described the room as a space meant for creation and collaboration and their artwork is made to honour the resilience of the Colombian people.

For a visit to a kindergarten class, the Duke and Duchess spent time with students, and worked on puzzles, while they conversed with the class.

Ms Basto said that once again Meghan spoke Spanish to the children and told one student:’You’re the same age as my son Archie!”

Prince Harry also practised his Spanish, asking students their names and age.

The kindergarteners also performed a song for the Duke and Duchess before presenting them with gifts of ponchos and dolls for Archie and Lilibet and handwritten letters.

Following the kindergarten visit, the Duke and Duchess and the ice president Marquez went to the school’s garden.

The garden has existed since 2020 and was created for students to not only learn to appreciate the Earth but also the farmers of Colombia who provide food for the country.

The Duke and Duchess also visited the school’s social and emotional gym, where Harry got down on his knees and donned boxing gloves before carrying out punches on a punch bag.

The exercises were part of a programme which highlights mental and physical exercises for students to learn how better balance their mental health and personal wellbeing.

The students demonstrated for the Duke, Duchess, and VP their own personal meditation techniques and how they balance their emotions, good and bad.

During their four-day visit the Sussexes will take in the city of Bogotá before heading off to Cartagena and Cali as part of a ‘cultural and social’ visit.

The couple attended a summit on digital responsibility last night, during which Harry appeared to take a swipe at Elon Musk. 

He told the audience in Bogota on Thursday: ‘What happens online within a matter of minutes transfers to the streets. People are acting on information that isn’t true.’

He added that a lot of people were ‘scared and uncertain ‘about the potential impact of AI and that ‘education and awareness’ would be key to tacking misinformation.

X founder Musk has come under intense criticism for misinformation on his platform relating to the events, with the world’s richest man even falling victim to it after sharing a fake story about Sir Keir Starmer looking at detainment camps for rioters.

And Harry said: ‘It comes down to all of us to be able to spot the true from the fake. In an ideal world those with positions of influence would take more responsibility.

‘We are no longer debating facts. For as long as people are allowed to spread lies, abuse, harass, then social cohesion as we know it has completely broken down.’

Meghan also told how the ‘digital age has almost created a culture where if you don’t have anything cool to say, don’t say anything at all – and that is fundamentally changing how we move through the world, how we connect with each other’.

Earlier yesterday, Harry and Meghan were met in Bogota by Colombia’s vice-president Francia Marquez and her husband Rafael Yerney Pinillo. 

They spent around half-an-hour at the vice-president’s residence, where they exchanged welcome gifts and were offered tea, coffee and traditional pandebono – Colombian cheese bread.

The Sussexes are being given a full security detail throughout their visit alongside Ms Marquez, who invited the couple to travel to Colombia after watching their Netflix docuseries for what has been dubbed a DIY royal tour.

Answering questions from journalists at a press conference ahead of their arrival, Ms Marquez said she was inspired to ask Harry and Meghan to visit the country after being moved by their Netflix documentary. 

‘I saw the Netflix series about their life, their story and that moved me and motivated me to say that this is a woman who deserves to come to our country and tell her story and her exchange will undoubtedly be an empowerment to so many women in the world,’ Ms Marquez said.

The Sussexes’ controversial six-part Netflix show, aired just three months after Queen Elizabeth II’s death, laid bare their troubled relationship with the royal family and the struggles which led to their decision to step back from the working monarchy.

Ms Marquez described the Sussexes’ trip as a ‘very special visit’ aimed at building bridges and joining forces against cyber-bullying and online digital violence and discrimination, as well as promoting women’s leadership in Colombia.

The Sussexes’ team has not confirmed how the trip is being funded, whether privately, through Harry and Meghan’s Archewell Foundation, by the Colombian government or other means.

The quasi-royal tour, which has many similarities to the programme of an official royal overseas visit, is the Sussexes’ second this year, after their three-day visit to Nigeria at the invitation of the West African nation’s chief of defence staff.

Harper’s Bazaar magazine, covering the trip as the only words pool, said Ms Marquez shared her personal admiration for Harry’s late mother Diana, Princess of Wales.

Meghan and Ms Marquez were pictured embracing as they greeted each other warmly, with Ms Marquez clasping Harry’s hands in her own as they were introduced yesterday.

The Sussexes were colour co-ordinated style-wise, with the duchess in a navy halterneck top and trousers and Harry in a dark blue suit and light blue shirt.

During the sit-down chat, Ms Marquez said she shared the same ideals and goals as Harry and Meghan amid their campaign to make the digital world safer for children.

Harry and Meghan visited a local school, the Colegio Cultura Popular, and joined a summit, in collaboration with their Archewell Foundation, about creating a healthier digital landscape.

They spoke to children in a session where the class talked about their favourite and least favourite parts of social media, technology and dealing with life on the internet.

Meghan said the group should aim to be ‘self-reliant and not tech-reliant’ while Harry about asked the conversations they have with their families about managing social media and literacy.

Ms Marquez, a lawyer and human rights and environmental activist, is Colombia’s first black vice-president and serves in the country’s first left-wing government, led by president Gustavo Petro.

Ensuring the couple’s security will be a high priority during their stay. The Foreign Office warns against all but essential travel to certain parts of Colombia, with kidnapping rates remaining high.

It also describes the country as ‘seriously afflicted by conflict’ with a resurgence in violence in parts of Colombia despite the peace agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) movement to end the civil war.

The Duke has meanwhile maintained it is ‘still dangerous’ for Meghan to return to the UK.

He is said to be missing the private funeral of his uncle Lord Fellowes – husband of Diana’s sister Lady Jane Fellowes – in Norfolk later this month due to his security fears.

Harry lost a High Court challenge against the Home Office in February over a decision to change the level of his personal security when he visits the UK, but he has been given the green light to appeal.

During the case, the court was told Harry believes his children cannot ‘feel at home’ in the UK if it is ‘not possible to keep them safe’ there and that he faces a greater risk than his late mother, with ‘additional layers of racism and extremism’.

Harry and Meghan stepped down from the working monarchy in 2020 and no longer travel at the request of the UK Government on official overseas royal visits, when travel costs would have usually been met by the taxpayer-funded Sovereign Grant.