Meghan Markle ‘reaches out’ to her father amid reports he is unwell in hospital | ITV News

The Duchess of Sussex has “reached out” to her estranged father, Thomas Markle, after reports he is unwell in hospital.

Meghan has been estranged from her father since her 2018 wedding after he was caught staging paparazzi photos in the run-up to the big day, and then suffered a heart attack.

A spokesperson for the Duchess of Sussex said: “I can confirm she has reached out to her father.”

Meghan is said to have previously tried to contact him in the past.

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Mr Markle, who moved to live in the Philippines, has never met his grandchildren, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet.

In the third episode of their 2022 Netflix documentary, the Duchess of Sussex said she discovered her father was not going to attend her wedding “through a tabloid”.

He went on to repeatedly speak to the media and later claimed he had been “shunned” by Meghan.

He criticised Meghan but still said he wanted to reunite with her, and publicly pleaded to be able to see Archie and Lili, saying in 2023: “She is not the person I knew as my daughter.”

The duchess previously won a High Court privacy and copyright claim against Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) over articles that reproduced parts of a “personal and private” handwritten letter she wrote to Mr Markle in a bid to get him to stop talking to the press.

Mr Markle was admitted to hospital after suffering a stroke in 2022, days before he reportedly had been planning to fly to the UK in June for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, with hopes to meet members of the royal family and his grandchildren.

This is the Talking Royals – our weekly podcast about the royal family, with ITV News Royal Editor Chris Ship and Producer Lizzie Robinson