A heartbroken Prince Harry has said he desperately wants to reconcile with his estranged family after his bitter split with the royals. But now, the Duke of Sussex has been warned the rapprochement he craves will not happen unless he says one simple, little word.

The 40-year-old told the world he wants to make up with the Royal Family in a bombshell BBC interview in which he also blasted courtiers for their role in downgrading his UK security. Upset at a court’s decision to reject his appeal against the removal of his high-level police protection, he lashed out and said his father, King Charles, “won’t speak to me because of this security stuff”. David Yelland, a former editor of The Sun, who is now a public relations adviser, said Harry “used the language of trauma” in the interview and showed a “sense of entitlement that the public can see”.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s When It Hits the Fan podcast, he praised the Duke as a “laudable person in many ways” but questioned the language he used in the BBC interview.

“Unfortunately, in PR, the words and language that you use are key,” said the host.

“Harry also used the word ‘reconciliation’.

“He clearly wants a rapprochement. But in order to get truth and reconciliation, you have to start to say ‘sorry’ for your part.

“The route to recovery, which is really what we’re talking about here, is that both sides, if we’re going to get anywhere, are going to have to apologise for their part in what has happened.

“I don’t see any sign of that at the moment in terms of his communications.”

Harry’s rupture with the Royal Family began in 2020, when he and his wife Meghan Markle stepped back from royal duties and moved to the US.

They now live in California with their two children, Archie and Lilibet.

Shortly after what was dubbed as Megxit, the couple gave an interview to Oprah Winfrey criticising the Royal Family and have gone on to cause further fury – most notably when the Duke released his tell-all memoir, Spare.

The book revealed the fights he had with his brother, Prince William.

Mr Yelland’s co-host Simon Lewis, who was communications secretary to Queen Elizabeth II, described the situation as “sad” for Prince Harry and the Royal Family but also said the “central tenet of PR is often timing – when you choose to do things, and secondly how you choose to do them”.

Mr Lewis believes the Duke could have waited before speaking out and said: “Perhaps he should have delivered some of his messages so much more elegantly.

“A less accusatory approach might have resulted in more sympathy.”