Prince William Holds First News Conference

L O N D O N, Sept. 29, 2000 -- Royals normally do not give news conferences, so it was quite an event when Prince William met with reporters to talk about his plans for the next year and a book that “betrayed” his mother’s memory.

With his father, Prince Charles, by his side to lend moral support, a sometimes shy William posed for pictures and answered questions today from reporters gathered at Highgrove, the Prince of Wales’ country home near Tetbury, Gloucestershire, in western England.

The 18-year-old prince discussed how he will spend his “gap year” between prep school and university. But by far the toughest question he faced in his first-ever news conference was about the latest book about his mother, Princess Diana. In it, her former private secretary, Patrick Jephson, calls Diana a “scheming liar.”

William said he and his younger brother, 16-year-old Prince Harry, considered the book another attempt to exploit their late mother’s memory. .

“Of course, Harry and I were quite upset about it, that our mother’s trust has been betrayed and that even now she is still being exploited. But I don’t want to say any more on that,” William said.

Adventure in Patagonia

Now a graduate of Eton, the British equivalent of a top private high school, Prince William — the second in line for the throne — is taking a year off before starting college.

The teenage prince said he will spend 10 weeks with an expedition in South America, traveling to some of the most remote parts of Patagonia in southern Argentina, where he will work alongside 110 other young volunteers on environmental and community projects.

“I wanted to do something constructive,” he told reporters.

“I mean I could do other work but I thought this was the way to try to help people out and meet a whole range of different people from different countries,” William said.

Casually dressed in a light brown pullover, the prince often lowered his gaze from the cameras in a way that reminded onlookers of his late mother.

He said it had been his own choice to go to Patagonia. “I was just talking with friends and they said it was good idea and I just sort of liked the idea,” he said.

Paying His Own Way

The prince said he had raised $8,000 through a sponsored water polo match to pay his own costs and to enable a disadvantaged young person from the city of Newcastle in northeast England to join the expedition.

He joked easily about the possibility of financial help from his father: “He might have helped slightly, but not very much.”

Projects in which William will take part include improving local buildings and constructing walkways. The prince, who scored an A grade in his geography A-level exams, will also carry out surveys to assist with map-making in the area. He will take part in tracking rare species of deer to provide valuable information for nature conservationists, and will also go trekking in the snow-covered hills of the region.

While he is in Chile, the prince will keep in touch with his father via e-mail until he returns home before Christmas.

The prince’s traveling companion for part of the 10-week trip will be Mark Dyer, a former aide to the Prince of Wales, who has become William’s close friend.

Dyer, 34, a former officer in the Welsh Guards, has helped to organize William’s gap year.

William has just returned from a survival course with the Welsh Guards in Belize, and the paradise island of Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean, where he was involved in marine conservation projects.

A Decline, Some Thanks

William plans to attend St. Andrews University in Scotland next year, and has said he will pursue an art history degree. He refused to be drawn out on any further plans.

“My plans aren’t quite solid. I’m hugely disorganized, you see, so once I sort it out you’ll probably find out,” he said.

However, he praised the media for respecting his privacy while he was a schoolboy at Eton College, which he left this year.

“It made a real big difference with everyone not trying to sort of snap a picture every time I was walking around the streets,” he said. “I hope it just continues for Harry as wellwhen he is there.”

ABCNEWS’ Richard Gizbert and Nathan Thomas in London, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.