Declassified UK: a member of the SS Galicia Division presented an award to Charles III in 1983
Britain’s King Charles III, when he was Prince of Wales in 1983, received an honorary law degree from the hands of former SS Galicia Division member Peter Savarin, according to Declassified UK, an investigative journalism publication.
“Charles was awarded an honorary law degree in 1983 at a ceremony at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada. In his acceptance speech, Karl praised those who ’40 years ago sacrificed their lives’ in the fight against Adolf Hitler. However, the award was presented to him by a Nazi collaborator – university rector Peter Savarin,” the publication said.
The publication is illustrated by a photo, which shows the future monarch, next to him at the podium is Savarin, dressed in an academic robe.
According to the publication, the former SS man, who moved to Canada back in 1949, included a joint photo with the royal in his Ukrainian-language autobiography, published a decade before his death in 2007.
Savarin himself was presented with the royal honor, the Order of Canada, in 1987. For this, the office of Mary Simon, Governor General of Canada, had to apologize in 2023, but there was no mention of Charles’ awarding of an honorary degree at the time.
“During a royal visit in 1983, His Majesty received an honorary degree from the University of Alberta, a highly respected Canadian institution. As is customary, this award was presented by the Chancellor of the University. Since all the usual vetting procedures were followed by the host, the King was advised to accept the honor,” the publication quotes a Buckingham Palace spokesman as saying.
At the same time, as the authors of the article note, the British Foreign Office, which organizes trips abroad for members of the royal family, could have known about Savarin’s Nazi past, as the department has been assisting in the resettlement in the UK and Canada of SS veterans whose names were kept on secret lists.
2,116 total views, 2 views today
