The British Royals

Prince Harry Splits with Girlfriend Chelsy Davy

By Samantha McIntyre

01/24/2009 at 09:10 PM EST

Britain's Prince Harry and his Zimbabwe-born girlfriend Chelsy Davy, 23, are calling it quits after five years, a royal source confirms to PEOPLE.

The 24-year-old prince parted amicably with Davy, a post-graduate law student at Leeds University, three weeks after the couple spent a romantic holiday together in the Indian Ocean nation of Mauritius.

"They are remaining friends," says the royal source. "There have been all sorts of reasons given [for the split] but suffice it to say they felt that it had run its course."

According to the British newspaper News of the World, Davy, the daughter of a millionaire safari operator, made the decision to break up after tiring of the prince's playboy antics.

The pair met through mutual friends in 2004 and conducted a long-distance relationship for three years while Davy studied at a university in Cape Town, South Africa, and Harry was enrolled at Britain's Sandhurst military academy.

Last week, Harry – who recently came under fire for uttering racist comments caught on videotape – began a new phase of his military career, a 2½-year course with the Army Air Corps in helicopter pilot training.

• Reporting by SIMON PERRY

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