The problem inherited from Carlos III: Prince Andrew refuses to leave the public scene

Monarchies always solve family problems with distance or ostracism.

Carlos III, however, does not use any of these solutions to put an end to the main dilemma that he inherited from his late mother, Queen Elizabeth: what to do with one of his three brothers?

what to do with prince andrew?

It might seem that Elizabeth II left it resolved.

In 2019, after the disastrous interview with the BBC in which the Duke of York (62 years old) wanted to distance himself, unsuccessfully, from the shady activities of his friend, the American pedophile millionaire Jeffrey Epstein, the queen ordered a complete removal from her favorite son of any public activity representing the British monarchy.

Three years later, in January 2022, Buckingham Palace took even more distance by withdrawing from Andrés all the military titles and royal patronages that he possessed.

It was then a matter of preventing his (then pending) trial for sexual abuse of a minor from casting the slightest shadow on the Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations.

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Andrés from England talks about his relationship with the pedophile Epstein: “I was not up to it.

It wasn't right"

He had a lot to do with this progressive withdrawal of the prince from the affairs of The Company (

, as the House of Windsor is known) his brother and then heir, Carlos, to whom Elizabeth II gave more and more freedom to bring order to a royal house that he would soon direct directly.

But the monarch reserved the right to act as a mother, and not only allowed Andrew to reappear on her arm on solemn public occasions - he accompanied her into Westminster Abbey at the funeral held a year after the death of Philip of Edinburgh—, but it was never entirely clear what financial aid he provided to the Duke of York to pay the 14 million euros that the out-of-court agreement with Virginia Giuffre, 39, cost.

The woman, who accused him of having raped her when she was a minor (17 years old) during several occasions arranged by the New York magnate Epstein and her girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell,

He agreed to withdraw his lawsuit after a negotiation that Andrés, who did not stop proclaiming his innocence, always denied that it existed until it was made public.

In fact, in the pact he does not recognize his guilt, although he does recognize Giuffre's role as a victim.

In theory, the embarrassing agreement - which was seen in the British press as an implicit admission of guilt, and provoked the general consensus that Andrés was history - committed the woman to cease her comments about the Duke of York.

She has not interpreted it that way, however, and has recently announced the publication of a memoir in which she plans to address the prince's abuses.

in the pact he does not recognize his guilt, although he does recognize Giuffre's role as a victim.

In theory, the embarrassing agreement - which was seen in the British press as an implicit admission of guilt, and provoked the general consensus that Andrés was history - committed the woman to cease her comments about the Duke of York.

She has not interpreted it that way, however, and has recently announced the publication of a memoir in which she plans to address the prince's abuses.

in the pact he does not recognize his guilt, although he does recognize Giuffre's role as a victim.

In theory, the embarrassing agreement - which was seen in the British press as an implicit admission of guilt, and provoked the general consensus that Andrés was history - committed the woman to cease her comments about the Duke of York.

She has not interpreted it that way, however, and has recently announced the publication of a memoir in which she plans to address the prince's abuses.

Prince Andrew was the companion of Elizabeth II at the memorial in honor of the Duke of Edinburgh, held in Westminster Abbey, on March 29, 2022.Getty

What could be interpreted as a simple defensive reaction has turned out to be an obvious attempt by the king's brother to resuscitate his image and try to raise his head: he has hired two prestigious Los Angeles lawyers, Andrew Brettler and Blair Berk, and threatens to file a lawsuit against Giuffre if he revives history with his book.

"In this way, his accusations will end up being subjected to the public scrutiny of a court of law for the first time," Andrés threatened through a paradoxical leak from his environment to the

.

It was precisely the transparency and publicity of a trial that he tried to avoid with the multi-million dollar agreement.

The Duke of York feels bolstered in his cause by new statements and facts—some especially grotesque—that have come to light in recent months.

Giuffre recently withdrew a lawsuit very similar to the one he filed against Andrés, this time addressed to American lawyer Alan Dershowitz.

A friend of Epstein's, he also accused him of alleged sexual abuse, but later admitted that he "could have made a mistake" in accusing him by pointing to the lawyer.

"I wish he decided to review his out-of-court agreement and continue fighting in court," Dershowitz recommended to the prince on the GBNews television channel, with a clearly conservative line.

"The pact does not contain an acknowledgment of his guilt, and I would love for the whole truth to come to light," said the lawyer.

Prince Andrew and Virginia Giuffre (in the center), in 2001. In the background, Ghislaine Maxwell, the 'madame' of Epstein.Shutterstock

Shortly after, last January, Ghislaine Maxwell (61 years old), the daughter of media mogul Robert Maxwell and Epstein's ex-girlfriend, sentenced in December 2021 to 20 years in prison for her task of recruiting underage women for her partner millionaire, gave a telephone interview from the cabin for prisoners in the Florida jail where she remains confined.

Not only did she persist in declaring her innocence, and she showed her regret for having established a relationship with Epstein, but she continued to defend the innocence of whom she still considers her friend, Prince Andrew.

It was in Maxwell's London apartment where she took the photo in which the Duke of York grabbed a young Virginia Giuffre by the waist.

Andrés' environment has not ceased to suggest, in recent years, that the photo was a montage.

"I don't think it's true"

Maxwell has repeated in his interview with Jeremy Kyle of TalkTV.

“In fact, I am convinced that it is not.

There has never been an original copy.

There is no photography as such.

I have only seen photocopies of it ”, she assured.

"They're back with the same nonsense," responded shortly after Michael Thomas, the

photographer to whom Giuffre first showed the photo in the apartment that the woman had on the central coast of Australia.

The

the same newspaper that published the controversial snapshot more than a decade ago, has shown the reverse of the image in response, which Thomas also photographed.

You can read the stamp

which according to experts consulted by the tablode itself would correspond to the date and the laboratory where it was revealed, three days after the alleged meeting in the London apartment.

“When they say it is false, they suggest that I am complicit in that falsehood.

And it's not," says Thomas.

"It's ridiculous that Maxwell is now coming up with this."

Prince Charles of England, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Andrew, in a file image, observe aerial military maneuvers from the balcony of Buckingham Palace DANIEL LEAL-OLIVAS (AFP)

To top off the conspiracy theories, the inmate's brother, Ian Maxwell (66 years old), leaked to

the bible of British conservatism

the photo that, according to him, would help dismantle the legend of Andrés and Giuffre's sexual bath.

The woman recounted, in never-published memoirs, but which ended up being part of the summary of the case against Ghislaine Maxwell, that the prince "began to suck her toes, and the plant" before having sex with her in the bed.

Such maneuvers, according to Giuffre, were carried out in a "Victorian-style porcelain bathtub that was in the middle of the bathroom" in the London apartment.

The brother, Ian, used two friends, to whom he made Victoria and Andrés each put on masks, to try to dismantle the accusation.

He put them, dressed, in the apartment's bathtub—conventional, and attached to the wall—to demonstrate that it was impossible in that space to carry out the sexual maneuvers described by Giuffre.

Andrew, out of Buckingham

Apparently unaware of his brother's recent adventures and misadventures, Carlos III has continued to erase him from the official photo with withering administrative efficiency.

At the end of last year, he achieved urgent approval, both in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords, of the State Counselors Act, which incorporated his brothers Princess Anne and Prince Edward to the list of members of the royal family who could replace him in his public tasks in case of illness or displacement abroad.

In this way —the list also includes the queen consort Camilia, or the princes of Wales, Guillermo and Kate—, the possibility that Andrés, or Prince Enrique, ended up occasionally replacing Carlos III was practically eliminated.

The last blow has been recent.

Buckingham Palace is going to start renovation works on the building, worth more than 400 million euros and lasting 10 years, and Andrés has already been informed that he will no longer have an office or bedroom in the residence par excellence of the British royal family.

In exchange, he will be allowed to have rooms at nearby St. James's Palace.

It remains to be clarified whether Carlos III will allow the presence of his ill-fated brother at his coronation ceremony, which will take place on May 6 at Westminster Abbey.

His absence would be the capstone of a slow process of public annihilation, although a discreet position on the abbey benches would be enough for the BBC cameras to take note, and prevent the Duke of York from clouding in the slightest the climax that his brother has been waiting for more than 70 years.