King Hosts Japanese Royals at Glittering State Banquet

The Your Majesty's My wife and I are so delighted to be able to welcome you to Buckingham Palace this evening. A Koko NI O kayeri nasai. Welcome back to Britain. Your Majesty's Ours is a partnership with deep roots. For over 400 years, our nations have inspired each other, learning from each other's experience and enriching our industries, cuisines and cultures with elements borrowed and shared. It has been a pleasure to learn of the British stories behind certain Japanese cultural icons. Perhaps you would allow me to note one particular individual who turns 50 this year, raised in a London suburb with her twin sister, a self-made entrepreneur worth billions of dollars and a UNICEF children's ambassador on top of all that. So I can only wish a very happy birthday to Hello Kitty, Your Majesty's. In 1613, Tokugawa Yayasu wrote to my forebear King James the 1st. He said those separated by 10,000 leagues of clouds and waves, our territories are, as it were, close to each other. Over 400 years later, that sentiment remains at the heart of our friendship. And so it is with a sense of great affection and optimism that I propose a toast to Your Majesty's and the Japanese people and to the next 400 years of Japanese British relations. Can pay.