President Connolly to represent Ireland at funeral of King Harald in Norway

PRESIDENT CATHERINE CONNOLLY will represent Ireland at the state funeral of King Harald V of Norway in Oslo today. 

The monarch died on 28 August at the age of 89. Europe’s oldest reigning monarch and a great-great-grandchild of Britain’s Queen Victoria, Harald reigned for 35 years.

President Connolly will be accompanied by her husband Brian McEnery. She will be among a number of heads of state in attendance.

A funeral procession will leave the royal palace in Oslo at 12pm (11am Irish time).

The casket will be carried on an artillery carriage along the city’s main avenue to the Lutheran cathedral, where the ceremony will begin at 1pm (12pm Irish time) with a minute of silence observed throughout the country.

Norway’s royal family, led by new King Haakon VIII, foreign royals, heads of state and dignitaries will take part in the procession on foot.

Only Harald’s widow, 89-year-old Queen Sonja, and the new Queen Mette-Marit, who underwent a lung transplant in June, will follow in a car.

Marius Borg Høiby, Mette-Marit’s son from a previous relationship who is under house arrest pending the appeal of a rape and assault conviction, has been granted permission to attend the funeral.

Following the funeral, President Connolly and her husband will attend a reception at Oslo City Hall hosted by foreign minister Espen Barth.

They will then travel to the Royal Palace where they will offer their condolences to King Haakon VIII and Queen Sonja on behalf of the people of Ireland.

In a statement ahead of the funeral, President Connolly said she learned of Harald’s death “with profound regret and sadness” and offered her sympathies to his family and the Norwegian people “on behalf of the people of Ireland”. 

She said Harald “served Norway and its people for over 35 years”.

“He will be remembered for his dedicated public service on behalf of the Norwegian people and his inclusivity. I am pleased to have the opportunity to travel to Oslo to offer my renewed condolences on this sad occasion.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the presidents of Finland, Germany and the Czech Republic as well as the French and Thai prime ministers are all expected to be present.

Among the royals set to attend are Britain’s Prince William, King Felipe of Spain, Japan’s Crown Prince Akishino and Princess Kiko, the Scandinavian royal families, the Belgian and Dutch royal couples, Prince Albert of Monaco and Jordan’s King Abdullah II.

High security

At the end of the religious service, four F-35 fighter jets will fly over the cathedral in a “missing man” formation, as the casket is taken to the Akershus Castle chapel.

There it will be lowered into the crypt of the royal mausoleum, next to Harald’s parents and grandparents.

He will be laid to rest in a €1.7 million sarcophagus whose design remains secret.

Once the burial is completed, flags across the country, which were lowered to half-mast after Harald’s death, will once again be raised and church bells will ring for an hour.

Norway’s police force has mobilised nearly 3,000 officers in what it has described as “one of the biggest operations” in its history.

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Some 3,500 soldiers have also been deployed, while exceptional airspace restrictions have been imposed over much of the eastern part of the country.

Despite mounting health woes in his later years, Harald had always ruled out abdicating, and was extremely popular among his fellow Norwegians.

Embodying an open and tolerant Norway, he made a deep impression by celebrating diversity in a 2016 speech marking the 25th anniversary of his reign.

“Norwegians are girls who love girls, boys who love boys, and girls and boys who love each other,” he said, adding: “Norwegians believe in God, Allah, the Universe and nothing.”

Thousands of Norwegians have filed past the king’s casket in the past week, some waiting in line for hours.

The square in front of the palace has been covered with flowers, drawings and candles.

“He was the grandfather of the nation,” said Gunn Johnsen (81), speaking to AFP on Tuesday, explaining that she took an hour-long train ride to pay her last respects.

Near the University of Oslo, a large billboard displayed a photo of a smiling Harald with the inscription “Thank you for everything”.

New monarch

Almost three out of four Norwegians (72%) said they support the monarchy, up by eight percentage points from a previous survey in May, in an opinion poll conducted after the king’s death and published last week.

Support had dropped to its lowest level in February, when 60% said they were in favour of maintaining the monarchy while 27% were not.

At the time, the royal family was embroiled in a series of scandals that damaged its image.

Mette-Marit in particular was under heavy criticism for her past ties to the late convicted American sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and her son’s legal troubles.

While Haakon VIII is very popular, opinions on the new queen remain deeply divided.

Mette-Marit was heavily criticised earlier this year for her ties to the late US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Documents published by the US Department of Justice in January revealed her sustained and at times intimate correspondence with Epstein between 2011 and 2014, at a time when the American financier had already been convicted of soliciting a minor. 

In a televised interview in March, Mette-Marit said she had been “manipulated” by Epstein and regretted the friendship, telling broadcaster NRK: “Of course I wish I had never met him.”

Several polls published around the same time showed that nearly half of the Norwegian public believed that she should not become queen.

In June, an Oslo court convicted Mette-Marit’s son Marius Borg Høiby of two counts of rape. 

He had been accused of 40 charges, carrying a maximum possible sentence of 16 years in prison.

Høiby pleaded guilty to several relatively minor offences but denied the alleged rapes, which the prosecution said took place while the women were asleep or passed out.

He was acquitted of two other counts of rape and convicted of domestic abuse against an ex-girlfriend, issuing threats and traffic violations.

He was sentenced to four years in prison, but has entered an appeal. He was released from prison to house arrest with electronic monitoring pending the appeal. 

While he has no formal role in the Norwegian royal family, his legal troubles dragged the monarchy into its biggest ever scandal.

With reporting from © AFP 2026