According to royal sources, the lack of official comment so far from Buckingham Palace regarding the latest Epstein document releases should not be seen as complacency, but royal aides are said to fully understand the sense of public upset.
It is understood that the Palace does not receive advance notice of the released files and that royal aides have been monitoring what has emerged.
The official position from Buckingham Palace remains that the King and Queen’s “thoughts and utmost sympathies have been, and will remain with, the victims and survivors of any and all forms of abuse”.
So far Andrew has shown no signs of giving evidence. He has always strongly denied any wrongdoing.
Last autumn, Democrats in the US Congress set a November deadline for the former prince to testify about what he knew about Epstein, but he gave no response.
The latest batch of emails have revealed the previous extent of US attempts to get Andrew to give evidence.
In the early months of 2020 there were multiple email exchanges between the US Department of Justice and Andrew’s legal team, in which the US authorities tried to pin down a time and place for him to give evidence.
This testimony could have been given in the UK or in the US, but the frosty exchanges between the lawyers made little progress, despite both sides pointing to Andrew’s public commitment to helping with investigating authorities.
