After days of heavy pressure, King Charles III of Britain has stripped the titles and honours of his brother, Price Andrew, due to his relationship with the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Prince Andrew will be known now as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor and will be evicted from his royal residence to a private accommodation.
"These censures are deemed necessary, notwithstanding the fact that he continues to deny the allegations against him", Buckingham Palace said in a statement (via AP). "Their Majesties wish to make clear that their thoughts and utmost sympathies have been, and will remain with, the victims and survivors of any and all forms of abuse".
Andrew was a friend of Jeffrey Epstein, and new emails found earlier this month proved that King's brother had remained in contact with the convicted child sex offender and trafficker longer than he previously admitted.
A photo of Andrew alongside Epstein (who died in 2019) and Harvey Weinstein, former Hollywood producer charged with dozens of sexual abuses, taken in Windsor Castle in 2006, the year the investigation started on Epstein's crimes, was also widely spread, increasing public pressure on the Crown to cut ties with Andrew. The matter even reached the Parliament on Wednesday, something that rarely happens with Royal Crown affairs.
On October 21, the posthumous memoirs of Virginia Giuffre titled Nobody's Girl were released. Giuffre, who died by suicide aged 41 last April, said that Andrew forced her to have sex with her three times, acting as if he believed "having sex with me was his birthright".