US President Joe Biden will join a long line of world leaders on Monday for Queen Elizabeth II’s state funeral at London’s Westminster Abbey, where the Royal Guards will be on full display to pay tribute to a monarch whose rule lasted seven decades.
Among the 2,000 attendees are expected to be world leaders, officials, politicians, public figures and European royalty.
The service will be conducted by the Reverend David Hoyle, the Dean of Westminster, in Westminster Abbey from 11am. (6 a.m. ET). UK Prime Minister Liz Truss and Patricia Scotland, the Commonwealth Secretary General, will deliver lectures. The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby will deliver a homily. Towards the end of the service, the Last Post will be played before a two minute silence is observed. The state funeral will be concluded by the Queen’s Piper, who at noon (7 a.m. ET) will play a Reveille, the National Anthem and a Lament.
Invitations were sent over the weekend to heads of state with whom the UK has diplomatic relations. The list of leaders attending the state funeral is long and includes leadership across the Commonwealth and around the world. Representatives of Syria, Russia, Belarus, Myanmar, Afghanistan and Venezuela will be absent. For most invitational nations, membership extends to the head of state plus one guest.
After the state funeral on Monday, the coffin will be moved from the hall to Wellington Arch before making its final journey from London to Windsor. The Queen’s journey will end at St George’s Chapel, in the grounds of Windsor Castle, where her coffin will be lowered into the Royal Vault below the chapel.
Monday’s ceremonies are the culmination of almost two weeks of public arrangements, code-named “Operation London Bridge”.
Plans for the Queen’s funeral have been in place for years, allowing American advisers greater insight into exactly what will happen in the coming days as they make security arrangements. The White House said it received an invitation only for the President and First Lady, leading to a slimmed-down American footprint.
Security in the British capital is at its highest level in memory as dozens of world leaders gathered over the weekend and Monday to remember the late queen, who met 13 sitting US presidents during her reign.
In an interview with Sky News last week, London Mayor Sadiq Khan said of the scale: “If you think about the London Marathon, the carnival, previous royal weddings, the Olympics – it’s all of that in one.”
Biden is scheduled to return to Washington Monday afternoon after the funeral. During their brief visit to London, the President and First Lady Jill Biden paid their respects to the Queen as she lay in state, signed books of condolence and attended a reception with other leaders and King Charles III.
The funeral will take place the same week world leaders are set to convene for the United Nations General Assembly in New York, where Biden will hold his first bilateral meeting with Truss on Wednesday.
