Jordan prince apologizes to king for 2021 palace crisis

Jordan’s royal court says that former crown prince Hamzah has met his half-brother King Abdullah II, and apologized over events that sparked an unprecedented palace crisis last year.

In a letter sent “earlier this week,” Prince Hamzah “took responsibility for his actions and offenses towards Jordan and His Majesty over the past years, including the incidents that followed in the sedition case,” a statement says.

The king and Hamzah met on Sunday evening “at the prince’s request,” it adds.

In April last year, Jordanian authorities announced they had foiled a bid to destabilize the pro-Western kingdom and had arrested 18 suspects, though most were later released.

Hamzah, whom the king sidelined as heir to the throne in 2004, accused Jordan’s rulers of corruption and ineptitude in a video message posted by the BBC on April 3.

He said the same day that he had been put under house arrest.

A Jordanian court in July sentenced two former officials to 15 years in jail after finding them guilty of a coup plot.

Hamzah was not charged in the trial, but the charge sheet said he was “determined to fulfill his personal ambition to rule, in violation of the Hashemite constitution and customs.”

The prince’s “acknowledgment of his mistake and apology represent a step in the right direction on the path to regaining his role as other Royal family members,” the statement says.

Hamzah expressed the hope that “we can turn the page on this chapter in our country’s and our family’s history,” according to a translation of his letter provided with the statement.