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Prince Andrew is to give up a series of royal titles including Duke of York immediately amid continuing controversy over his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and a woman who claimed she was abused by both the disgraced financier and the prince.

Buckingham Palace, the official residence of the prince’s brother King Charles, announced the move in a statement on Friday evening, less than two days after the Guardian newspaper started serialising extracts from a posthumous memoir by Virginia Giuffre. In the first extract, Giuffre, who died by suicide in Australia in April, wrote that the prince had regarded sex with her as his “birthright”.

Giuffre in 2021 accused the prince of sexually assaulting her when she was 17, after Epstein introduced her to him. Prince Andrew, who has consistently denied Giuffre’s claims, settled the case in 2022 without admitting liability but making a substantial donation to a charity run by Giuffre.

The prince, 65, gave up his public royal duties in 2019 after an attempt to clear his name in an interview with the BBC’s Newsnight programme backfired.

The prince said in the statement that, after discussions with the king and his “immediate and wider family”, they had concluded that the “continued accusations” about the prince were distracting from “the work of his majesty and the royal family”.

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

He said he stood by his decision five years ago to stand back from public life, but added: “We feel I must now go a step further. I will therefore no longer use my title or the honours which have been conferred upon me.”

Prince Andrew reiterated his denial of any wrongdoing, saying: “I vigorously deny the accusations against me.”

A person close to Buckingham Palace indicated that the king was “glad” about the outcome.

The decision means the prince will no longer use the titles which Queen Elizabeth conferred on him when he married Sarah Ferguson in 1986. Ferguson, who divorced the prince in 1996, has already stopped using her former title of Duchess of York.

As well as his English title of Duke of York, the prince will give up the remaining titles conferred on him, including his Scottish title, Earl of Inverness and his Northern Irish title, Baron of Killyleagh.

He will also no longer attend events such as the royal family’s traditional Christmas celebration at Sandringham. He had continued to appear at the festive celebration since giving up his public duties, but was not present last year.

The prince, who gave up the title “his royal highness” in 2022, will still be known as a prince because of his status as son of the late queen.

The change in Prince Andrew’s status represents one of the biggest decisions that the king has had to take about the family since taking over from his mother following her death in September 2022.

Epstein was found dead in his jail cell while awaiting trial for sexual offences in New York in 2019. The British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of sex trafficking and other offences in relation to the sex offender in 2021 and is serving a 20-year sentence in a federal prison.

Prince Andrew is just one of several prominent figures on both sides of the Atlantic to face ongoing questions about his ties to Epstein.

US President Donald Trump has faced persistent political pressure over his connections to the sex offender, who he once described as a friend before the two men had a falling out more than two decades ago. Giuffre met Maxwell when Giuffre worked at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

A congressional panel investigating the US federal government’s handling of materials relating to Epstein on Friday published a tranche of some 8,000 documents from the convicted paedophile’s estate.

Additional reporting by Lauren Fedor in Washington