William, Kate initiate pre-Brexit charm offensive on three-day visit to Germany

[caption id=“attachment_3836971” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  Prince William and wife Kate Middleton began a three-day visit to Germany on Wednesday billed as a “charm offensive” by local media as Britain begins thorny Brexit talks in earnest. William, who is second in line to the British throne, and Kate touched down in Berlin from Poland accompanied by their young children George and Charlotte. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3836977” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  The first stop for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge was a lunch of cod, tuna and salmon at the giant modern office complex of Chancellor Angela Merkel, widely considered the European Union’s most powerful leader. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3836985” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  German media said the long-planned visit was auspiciously timed as negotiations on Britain leaving the EU get under way in fits and starts. At a speech at a garden party at the British embassy, Prince William said Germany and Britain “proudly share the same values as open and democratic societies and the same determination to champion those values and to defend them”. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3837001” align=“alignleft” width=“940”]  “I am confident we shall remain the firmest of friends,” William added in the speech. The visit to Berlin was also steeped in history including a stop to greet cheering crowds at the Brandenburg Gate, the landmark symbol of German unity, and a viewing of the sprawling Holocaust Memorial in the heart of the capital. AP[/caption]   [caption id=“attachment_3837003” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  In Poland, the royal couple met freedom icon and Nobel peace laureate Lech Walesa and visited a former Nazi German concentration camp. The pair then visited a charity caring for at-risk youth in the former communist eastern district of Marzahn before having afternoon tea with German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier (right) and his wife (left) at his urban palace. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3837039” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  They returned to Berlin late on Thursday for a party at a century-old dance hall to meet Berliners working in “creative industries” before completing their European tour on Friday in the port city of Hamburg at the spectacular new Elbphilharmonie concert hall. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3837041” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  Britain played a major part in the institutional reconstruction of post-World War II West Germany, helping to craft the Constitution in 1949. It also stationed armed forces in West Germany as part of the West’s bulwark against the Soviet Union. AP[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_3837045” align=“alignnone” width=“940”]  The British royal family has long ancestral ties with Germany. The dynasty was a branch of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, but changed its name to the House of Windsor in 1917 because of anti-German sentiment in World War I Britain.[/caption]