Oslo (AFP) - Thousands of people gathered outside Norway’s royal palace to pay their respects to King Harald, who died Friday aged 89 after a reign of three and a half decades.

Harald’s 53-year-old son immediately succeeded him on the throne, announcing he would reign under the name King Haakon VIII.

Haakon takes over a monarchy long hailed for its modernity and modesty, but beset by a string of scandals in recent years.

The new king arrived at the palace with his 22-year-old daughter Ingrid Alexandra – the new crown princess – to formally inform the government of his father’s death.

In a statement, Haakon thanked “the government and Norwegian people for their support and sympathy for the Royal Family in this time”.

“An era has ended. A new one begins. The king is dead. Long live the king,” Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said in a speech shortly after meeting the new monarch.

“We will remember King Harald for his love for his people, for his humour and warmth, and for his unwavering faith in us,” he said.

Europe’s oldest reigning monarch, King Harald had been in hospital in Oslo since August 17, suffering from haemolytic anaemia, a condition caused by an abnormally rapid destruction of red blood cells that leads to fatigue and shortness of breath.

Store said Harald, who ascended to the throne in 1991, was “a king of his time and for his time,” noting that he accompanied Norway through decades of enormous change during which the country “grew richer, we became more numerous, and we became more diverse”.

Harald’s coffin would be brought to the Royal Palace from the hospital at 6:30 pm (1630 GMT), the palace announced Friday afternoon.

It added that the coffin would be accompanied by King Haakon and Queen Mette-Marit as well as Crown Princess Ingrid Alexandra, Queen Sonja, Prince Sverre Magnus and Princess Marta Louise.

The public would at that stage be able to visit and view the king at the palace’s chapel, the palace said.

Thousands of Norwegians massed outside the palace in Oslo, even as it began to rain. They laid down mountains of flowers, cards, cuddly toys and Norwegian flags, and many hugged and held each other.

“He was the king of the people,” mourner Kristoffer Hamre told AFP.

The government announced a period of national mourning until the king’s funeral, the date of which is yet to be set.

The palace lowered its flag to half-mast in the morning after Harald’s death was announced, but it was raised again after Haakon arrived for the meeting with the government.

Another flag on the royal balcony and those at other official buildings will remain at half-mast until after Harald’s burial.

- The right words -

Like many mourners, Vigdis Haug, 65, said she valued Harald’s ability to unify people.

“I think he has been such a down-to-earth king who has cared about all of us, and the words he always uses when he gives a speech are so wise and so valuable,” she told AFP.

Harald was widely seen as the embodiment of an open and tolerant Norway.

Many of those AFP spoke with pointed in particular to his speech after neo-Nazi Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people in twin attacks on July 22, 2011, in Norway’s worst massacre since World War II.

“He was someone who always seemed to find the words that brought us together and gave us a sense of security,” Caroline Vagle, a reporter for magazine Se og Hor, told AFP.

Tributes poured in from leaders around the world, including those of France, Germany, India, Italy, Jordan and Ukraine, as well as the royal houses of Europe.

Britain’s King Charles III spoke in a statement of his “profound sadness” at losing his “dear cousin”.

Harald was king when the Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) were negotiated in the 1990s, and Israeli President Isaac Herzog said he was “deeply saddened” by his passing.

- Turbulent year -

Harald faced mounting health problems in his final years, forcing him to scale back his official schedule.

But he ruled out abdicating, arguing that he took a lifelong oath before the Norwegian parliament.

The past year has been a turbulent one for the Norwegian royal family.

In addition to his own health struggles, his wife Queen Sonja, also 89, was briefly admitted to hospital in May due to heart problems.

Haakon’s wife Mette-Marit is under scrutiny for her ties to the late US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

In June, Mette-Marit’s son from a relationship prior to her marriage to Haakon, Marius Borg Hoiby, was sentenced to four years in prison for two rapes.

Suffering herself from a serious lung disease, Mette-Marit, 53, had to undergo a lung transplant in July.