- Prince Harry said he was not aware of a joint statement in his name denying William had bullied him.
- It followed a story suggesting William had bullied Harry and Meghan Markle out of the family.
Prince Harry said he knew nothing about a joint statement from Kensington Palace denying his brother, Prince William, had bullied him and his wife, Meghan Markle, out of the family until it was already released.
Following news in January 2020 that Harry and Meghan would be stepping back from their duties as senior royals, a news story in The Times of London suggested the reason for their departure was because William had bullied them.
Harry said that after a meeting at the time with his brother, his father Charles, and Queen Elizabeth II, in which they discussed the terms of his move away from royal duties, he was "told about a joint statement that had been put out in my name and my brother's name squashing the story about him bullying us out of the family."
"No one had asked me permission to put my name to a statement like that," Harry said during a new installment of episodes from "Harry & Meghan," a Netflix docuseries about the couple's choice to leave royal life behind.
The statement read: "Despite clear denials, a false story ran in a UK newspaper today speculating about the relationship between The Duke of Sussex and The Duke of Cambridge. For brothers who care so deeply about the issues surrounding mental health, the use of inflammatory language in this way is offensive and harmful."
"The saddest part of it was this wedge created between myself and my brother, so that he's now on the institution's side," Harry said, adding that he understands William's responsibility to the "survivability and the continuation of the institution" as heir to the throne after Charles.
Kensington Palace did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Harry said when he heard about the statement in his name, he called Meghan, who "burst into floods of tears because within four hours [of the news report], they were happy to lie to protect my brother, and yet for three years, they were never willing to tell the truth to protect us."
Meghan said this was the point when she realized "it's never going to stop."
"Every rumor, every negative thing, every lie, everything that I knew wasn't true and that the palace knew wasn't true and internally they knew wasn't true that was just being allowed to fester," Meghan said in the series.
There was "no other option at this point," Harry said. "I said, 'We need to get out of here.'"
Volume II of the Netflix docuseries dropped on Thursday, a week after Volume I.