UK’s Prince Andrew Says Giving up Royal Title

“I will no longer use my title or the honors bestowed upon me,” Andrew, 65, said in a statement.

His decision was made by his brother, King King III. He said it followed discussions with Charles and his own “immediate and wider family”.

“As always, I decided to put my duty to my family and my country first,” he said.

He again denied all the allegations but said: “We have concluded that the ongoing allegations against me are a distraction from the work of Her Majesty and the Royal Family.”

Andrew, who withdrew from public life in 2019, was a member of the late Queen Elizabeth II. He will remain prince as he is Elizabeth’s second son.

However, he will no longer bear the title of Duke of York given to him.

His ex-wife Sarah Ferguson will no longer use the title of Duchess of York, but their daughters Beatrice and Eugenie will remain princesses.

The bombshell announcement came after new allegations emerged this week in the memoir published after the death of Virginia Giuffre, the woman at the center of the Epstein scandal.

She wrote that Andrew acted like it was his “birthright” to have sex with her.

In “Nobody’s Daughter: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice,” Giuffre said she had sex with Andrew on three separate occasions, including when she was under 18.

Giuffre came to public prominence after claiming that disgraced US financier Epstein used her as a sex slave and that Andrew assaulted her.

Andrew repeatedly denied Giuffre’s accusations and avoided prosecution by paying a multimillion-dollar settlement.

In excerpts published by The Guardian this week, Giuffre says she met the prince in London in March 2001, when she was 17.

She was allegedly asked to guess Andrew’s age and got it right, adding as explanation: “My girls are just a little younger than you.”

– ‘Official’ –

Giuffre and Andrew later went to the Tramp nightclub in London, where “I remember she was a clumsy dancer and she was sweating a lot,” he said.

He claimed that they then returned to the London home of Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s partner and ex-girlfriend, and had sex there.

“He was friendly enough but still entitled, as if he believed it was his birthright to have sex with me,” Giuffre wrote.

Giuffre, a US and Australian citizen, committed suicide on April 25 at her farm in Western Australia.

Andrew’s relationship with Epstein tarnished his reputation and made him an embarrassment to the king.

In a devastating television interview in 2019, Andrew, once considered a handsome war hero who served as a helicopter pilot in the Falklands War, denied meeting Giuffre and defended his friendship with Epstein.