Queen to welcome Commonwealth leaders as group seeks mission
LONDON — The flags of more than 50 nations are flying outside Buckingham Palace as Queen Elizabeth II prepares to welcome leaders from the Commonwealth, an international club with an eclectic membership, an identity problem and an uncertain future.
The Commonwealth, an association of the U.K. and its former colonies, includes 53 countries, from populous India to tiny Tuvalu, held together loosely by historic ties, the English language and affection for the queen, who turns 92 on Saturday and has no designated successor as head of the group.
Philip Murphy, director of the University of London’s Institute of Commonwealth Studies, wrote in the Guardian newspaper the group was like “a grandfather clock that has been in the family for generations. It hasn’t told the right time for decades, but no one has the heart to take such a treasured heirloom to the (dump).”
Yet the old piece of furniture is getting a polish and a tuneup. With the U.K. set to leave the European Union next year, British authorities see the Commonwealth as a potential cornerstone of post-Brexit “global Britain.”