Chicago – April 30, 2026
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said on Wednesday he encourages Britain’s King Charles to return the Koh-i-Noor Diamond, with his comments coming during the British monarch’s ongoing U.S. visit.
“If I were to speak to the king separately from that, I would probably encourage him to return the Koh-i-Noor Diamond,” Mamdani, who is Indian American, said when asked at a press conference hours before a ceremony that commemorated victims of the deadly September 11, 2001, attacks.
Later in the day, the king spoke with Mamdani at the ceremony. Buckingham Palace declined to comment. Mamdani’s office did not respond to a request to comment on whether Mamdani brought up the issue with the king.
India has previously repeatedly demanded that Britain return the 105-carat diamond.
Britain’s then colonial governor-general of India arranged for the huge diamond to be presented to Queen Victoria in 1850 after the East India Company had annexed the region of Punjab in 1849 and taken the diamond from a deposed Indian leader.
Charles on Wednesday commemorated victims of the September 11, 2001, attack on New York City, laying a floral bouquet at the memorial where the World Trade Center’s twin towers once stood.
