LONDON - The postponement of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles's wedding until Saturday, to enable the British heir to the throne to attend the pope's funeral, will not disrupt other couples' plans to marry at the Windsor town hall that day, officials said.
Officials at the Guildhall in Windsor, west of London, were keen to stress that three couples who had already booked weddings in the afternoon would not be displaced by the last-minute changes made after the death of Pope John Paul II on Saturday.
"The couples concerned have booked their weddings and that's when they want to have them," said Anne Dackombe from the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead. "We wouldn't see that we could move those at all."
The hall was still available in the morning, another official said.
No new time has been given for the royal wedding, originally to be celebrated Friday with a civil ceremony at the Guildhall and then a prayer blessing and party held at Queen Elizabeth II's Windsor Castle nearby.
But the prince's spokesman said: "It is expected that the arrangements will be largely the same as previously planned and more details will be announced as soon as possible."
In lieu of original plans to marry his longtime companion on Friday, Charles will travel to the Vatican for the funeral of the pope as the representative of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.
"That must take priority," a spokeswoman at the queen's Buckingham Palace said. "Diaries are being rescheduled to fit the royal wedding in on Saturday."
Other wedding guests expected to fly to Rome include Prime Minister Tony Blair and the head of the Anglican Church, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, who is also due to perform the blessing ceremony of Charles and Parker Bowles at St George's Chapel inside Windsor Castle.
04/04/2005 16:51 GMT