Buckingham Palace strips royal titles, duties of Prince Andrew.
This week, the Buckingham Palace in London, home to the Queen of England, sent out a statement regarding the infamous Prince Andrew.
Buckingham Palace put out one of its legendarily brief statements with a shocking 42-word announcement. It revealed that Prince Andrew, the Duke of York has been stripped of his honorary military roles and official patronages and that he will no longer use his styling as ‘His Royal Highness’.
"With The Queen's approval and agreement, The Duke of York’s military affiliations and Royal patronages have been returned to The Queen," Buckingham Palace said in a statement.
"The Duke of York will continue not to undertake any public duties and is defending this case as a private citizen."
However, Buckingham Palace hasn't removed his royal titles because it can't — not without British parliament. Doing so would be a complex process, according to Marlene Koenig, a royal historian and expert on British and European royalty.
For one, there is the matter of his military titles, where he serves as colonel-in-chief of nine military regiments. Though Andrew could publicly give these up, and the publication says that the majority of “senior commanders now believe it is impossible for the Duke of York to continue in his role,” the Queen would have to remove them.
He will now fight the civil sex abuse case he is facing in the United States as a “private citizen”, having been accused by Virginia Giuffre of abusing her on three occasions when she was a teenager. The Prince denies the allegations, and in the interview denied having ever met Giuffre.
Prince Andrew has stepped down from public duties and has remained almost entirely out of the public eye, except for remarks he gave following the death of his father, Prince Philip. But that hasn’t stopped the public from reacting when news of the lawsuit drops.
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