DUBAI (Reuters) - Britain's King Charles wore a tie bearing the colours and symbols of the Greek national flag to a climate conference on Friday, days after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak snubbed his Greek peer Kyriakos Mitsotakis in a row over the Parthenon Sculptures.
Charles, who wore the tie when he met Sunak on the sidelines of COP28 in the United Arab Emirates and when he delivered a speech at the event, has Greek lineage through his father, the late Prince Philip who was born on the Greek island of Corfu.
Sunak deepened a diplomatic row with Athens on Wednesday by accusing Mitsotakis of "grandstanding" during a recent trip to London over ownership of the Parthenon Sculptures. Sunak cancelled a planned meeting with Mitsotakis earlier in the week.
A Buckingham Palace source said on Friday that Charles also wore the same tie last week, before the escalation of the dispute. A spokesperson for Sunak declined to comment.
British media noted that, as well as the blue and white tie featuring the same white cross design as the Greek flag, Charles sported a blue and white handkerchief protruding from his jacket pocket.
"In a week when Rishi Sunak cancelled a meeting with the Greek Prime Minister to make a 'stand' over the #ParthenonMarbles #ElginMarbles … King Charles appears to have chosen to wear a very interesting tie when he met Mr Sunak in Dubai today," ITV (LON:ITV) television's Royal Editor Chris Ship said on social media platform X.
Athens has long called on the British Museum to permanently return the 2,500-year-old sculptures that British diplomat Lord Elgin removed from the Parthenon temple in 1806. The museum has said it would consider a loan to Greece only if Athens acknowledges the museum's ownership of the sculptures.