Prince Andrew's settlement 'worth £12 mn' as anger mounts in UK
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Prince Andrew's settlement 'worth £12 mn' as anger mounts in UK
Disgraced British royal Prince Andrew faced a call Wednesday to "live out his retirement in ignominy" after reportedly settling a sexual assault lawsuit for a whopping £12 million ($16.3 million, 14.3 million euros).
The lawyer for US accuser Virginia Giuffre revealed on Tuesday that both parties had settled out of court, sparing Andrew the public humiliation of a trial. The details were not revealed.
Giuffre has said she had sex with Andrew when she was 17 and a minor under US law, after meeting him through the late US financier Jeffrey Epstein, who took his own life in prison while awaiting trial for sex crimes.
The prince has not been criminally charged and has denied the allegations.
The Daily Telegraph newspaper reported that Andrew was to pay £10 million to Giuffre and £2 million to a charity for victims of sex trafficking.
His team told AFP they would not comment on the contents of the deal.
The settlement raised questions of who is footing the bill for the perennially cash-strapped prince, with the Telegraph reporting it would come from one of the private estates belonging to his mother Queen Elizabeth II.
The scandal has threatened to overshadow the queen's Platinum Jubilee this year, marking her 70 years on the throne. Any jury trial could have coincided with nationwide jubilee celebrations due to take place in the summer.
It also means Andrew, 61, will no longer be questioned under oath by Giuffre's lawyers, who had been due to travel to London next month.
The court filing said Andrew "regrets his association with Epstein, and commends the bravery of Ms. Giuffre and other survivors in standing up for themselves and others".
"He pledges to demonstrate his regret for his association with Epstein by supporting the fight against the evils of sex trafficking, and by supporting its victims," it added.
- 'Finished' -
But British media said the prince was now "finished", and called on him to withdraw entirely from public life, after he was already stripped of his honorary military ranks and the title of "His Royal Highness".
"A man truly determined to clear his name of such heinous allegations would have fought tooth and nail... and then, if he won, tried to rebuild his life," said an editorial in The Sun.
"That is all over. Andrew is finished -- undone by his insufferable arrogance, entitlement and staggering naivety.
"He must retreat entirely from public life and live out his retirement in ignominy," it added.
British commentators also ridiculed Andrew for claiming he had never met Giuffre, querying why he had agreed in that case to settle for such an apparently large amount, and pointing to a photograph of the pair together when she was 17.
His lawyers had questioned the authenticity of the photo, which also showed socialite and Epstein friend Ghislaine Maxwell.
Others called for transparency on where the settlement money is coming from, whether from the queen's private income or from official sources effectively backed by British taxpayers.
Mark Stephens, a media specialist at law firm Howard Kennedy, told BBC television that "Andrew is going to have to confirm that the public hasn't paid this, because that threatens to have wider implications for the royal family".
Giuffre, now 38, alleged that Andrew sexually assaulted her at Maxwell's London home after a night out dancing in March 2001.
In December, Maxwell was convicted of recruiting and grooming young girls to be sexually abused by Epstein.
Giuffre also said Andrew assaulted her at Epstein's home in New York, and on Epstein's private island in the US Virgin Islands.
Andrew, the queen's second son, withdrew from royal duties in 2019 after a widely ridiculed BBC interview where he defended his relationship with Epstein and sought to rebut Giuffre's accusations.
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