Prince William was cheered by hundreds of wellwishers in Tallinn during a walkabout on his last engagement of the first day of his trip to Estonia and posed for countless selfies
Prince William takes selfies on Estonia visit
Selfies, handshakes and loud cheers marked the end of Prince William’s first day in Estonia as he spent almost 40 minutes greeting members of the public. Hundreds of well-wishers gathered outside Cleantech Association in Tallinn, waiting to catch a glimpse of the prince after he attended a workshop with a range of renewable energy startups and heard how Estonia and other Baltic states are ushering in a new era of energy security.
Just last month, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania asserted their energy independence from Russia by desynchronising from the Russian-controlled electricity grid and joining the European electricity network. This significant change has allowed the Baltic states to achieve greater energy independence and integrate and draw on more renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind.
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As founder of the Earthshot Prize, the prince is a huge advocate for finding innovative solutions to tackle environmental challenges and during his visit to the Cleantech Association he was able to meet Estonian clean energy companies who are doing just that.
William accepted gifts and cards for his family and stopped to pat a white terrier. “She’s a Scottish dog, your royal subject,” said her owner. “I can tell she’s very well looked after,” he replied. “A very soft coat. You’ve had a little haircut, haven’t you? You want to look your best” he said to the terrier as he continued to stroke her.
He recognised another face from earlier in the walkabout, saying: “I’ve seen you already, you’ve come around! I remember faces you see, I know.” One man told him, “All the best to your father.” He also appeared to drop one fan’s phone as he snapped pictures but apologised as he picked it up and handed it back to them.
After taking a selfie with him, the Prince joked as he looked towards his waiting car, “I think I can see the end of the line down there somewhere.” At one point he stopped to check the person who had handed him the phone was in the picture. “I don’t want to take pictures with someone else’s camera and put the wrong person in it.”
Earlier today, William repeatedly praised the ‘resilence’ of the Ukrainian people as he donned a friendship band in their country’s colours on a visit to ‘The Freedom School’ for refugees. William, 42, was visiting the educational establishment in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, where he also played basketball with students and learnt to say – admittedly not very confidently – good afternoon in both Estonian and Ukrainian.
Taking a seat with students aged 16 to 18 in a Ukrainian language lesson, he told them encouragingly: “It’s looking forward to the future in a positive way, it’s very important. It’s been a very difficult few years for you guys. Everyone sees that. What I love is (that) Ukrainian resilience is everywhere.
“You all are very smiley and very strong and very spiritual people. And honestly that comes across everywhere. Even the Ukrainians I’ve met in the UK and like that – very resilient and very strong about things. You have a very good spirit, very good souls, it’s very important. Even if your language is very hard to learn. I need to take some of these big words with me to look at, learn my languages better.”
Before that heard the pleas of Estonia’s president for some UK troops to remain in the Baltic state after the statesman suggested they may be redeployed as peacekeepers in Ukraine.
William has flown to Estonia to meet those UK forces at Tapa Army Base providing a deterrent against potential Russian aggression towards the country on Nato’s eastern flank with President Vladimir Putin’s regime. He sat down for talks with President Alar Karis at the start of a two-day visit to the country where the UK’s largest permanent overseas deployment of around 900 service personnel are based.