King Presses 'Nuclear Button': Prince No More, Duke No More, Mansion No More
King Charles strips Prince Andrew of all titles and his Windsor residence — a final, unprecedented act of royal reckoning that leaves the Duke of York without title, status, or the huge sanctuary
The King has decided to strip Andrew of his “prince” title and that he can no longer live in his Royal Lodge home at Windsor. This morning, he has officially lost his Duke of York title - after a “creative” choice by the King. The King’s decision to remove Andrew’s royal titles and oust him from his Windsor home is a “humiliating fall from grace”, a royal correspondent has said. The Telegraph’s India McTaggart told Sky News that the word “unprecedented” is often overused in royal reporting - but it’s “absolutely warranted” in this case. “The King stripping Andrew of all his remaining titles was his nuclear button, and I think that the Palace left no room for misunderstanding in its statement released yesterday,” she said. Explaining why the King came to his decision, McTaggart said it was the “sheer amount of potentially compromising material”. She also explained why Andrew will suffer particularly after the King’s decision. “There are few living royals who put as much store by status and title as he did so, yes [it will sting],” she said. “He really sort of used it as a currency with the friends that he gathered and the various roles that he held, so this will hurt.” As well as losing his royal titles, Andrew has been ordered to leave Royal Lodge - a 30-room mansion that has been his home for more than 20 years. The sprawling property is located in Windsor Great Park, and was granted to Andrew by the late Queen. It sits on an estate of 99 acres and has a swimming pool, an aviary, six lodge cottages, a gardener’s cottage and accommodation for police protecting the royals to stay in. Andrew will now be moving to a property on the Sandringham Estate. Situated in Norfolk, the estate is around 100 miles north of London and is privately owned by the King - Sky News
Presumably speaking on behalf of the government, UK trade minister Chris Bryant told BBC Breakfast that he’s “delighted” Andrew has been stripped of his title as a prince. “We warmly, I warmly support what the King is doing today,” the Labour minister said, adding: “I think the vast majority of people in this country will think that it’s the right thing to do.” Asked if Parliament should pursue questions about where Andrew has been getting his money from, he said: “I think it’s perfectly legitimate.” “I’m absolutely sure that the Royal household would want to co-operate with Parliament in anything that it wanted to do in that regard.”
The Democratic congressman Suhas Subramanyam, who has previously called for Andrew to testify before a US Congressional committee about his links to Epstein and Maxwell, urged Andrew to give evidence. He said: “It’s clear that Prince Andrew has information about Epstein’s crimes and he must do more than just give up titles or hide from the public spotlight. He owes it to the victims to share everything he knows about Epstein’s criminal operation and come before the oversight committee. “Regardless, we will continue to pursue the files and all the evidence, no matter how rich and powerful the perpetrators involved.” - The Guardian
Though former Prince Andrew’s troubles generated huge headlines in the UK and around the Commonwealth, regional and international broadcasters had other issues on their mind. This is the TV wall at Turkish Airline’s lounge in Istanbul
Russian figures close to the Kremlin are mounting a last-minute attempt to halt the extradition from Dubai of a Romanian-French mercenary wanted in Romania for plotting a coup. Horațiu Potra, a shadowy former French Foreign Legionnaire, was arrested at Dubai airport on 24 September alongside his son and nephew as they prepared to board a flight to Moscow. Romanian investigators had accused the men of conspiring with Potra’s ally, the far-right politician Călin Georgescu, to “overthrow the constitutional order”. Romanian officials have confirmed Potra’s arrest in Dubai and said they were working with UAE authorities to secure his extradition for trial in Romania, while the country’s general prosecutor said in interviews with local media that Potra was thought to be seeking asylum in Russia. The effort to block his extradition is being led by Igor Spivak, the head of the Russian Middle East Society, a group with close ties to the Russian foreign ministry, and by Alexander Kalinin, a Moldovan-born Russian proxy who fled to Moscow and is recruiting Moldovans to fight in Ukraine alongside Russian forces. “We are currently trying to stop Potra’s extradition,” Spivak said in a phone interview on Monday. “We have a lot of experience, and a lot of people are working on getting him freed,” he said, adding that he had hired a “group of our very reputable lawyers” in the UAE who were working on getting Potra released and planned to travel to Dubai himself. Earlier this month, Potra had tried to annul the arrest warrant in Romania through his lawyers, but a judge denied the request. The revelation sheds fresh light on Potra’s connections to Moscow - The Guardian
A summit between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin was officially called off, cementing a deterioration of ties between Washington and Moscow. The cancellation — Trump had cast doubt on attending in recent days — was reported by the Financial Times, which said the Kremlin had refused to make concessions over the war in Ukraine. Relations between the US and Russia have whipsawed since Trump returned to office in January, but Washington has largely trended towards strengthening ties with Kyiv over Moscow in recent weeks. Two pro-Ukraine activists wrote in The Wall Street Journal, meanwhile, that some polling indicated core Republican voters are now warming to the idea of strengthening military support for Kyiv. - Semafor
Israel’s military on Thursday confirmed the identities of the remains of two more hostages returned by Hamas, the latest to be handed over as part of the Gaza ceasefire agreement. The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that the remains were those of Sahar Baruch and Amiram Cooper, who were both captured during the 7 October 2023 Hamas militant attack that sparked the Israel-Hamas war. “The government of Israel shares in the deep sorrow of the Cooper and Sahar families and all the families of the fallen hostages,” it said in a statement. According to the Israeli military, the two sets of remains were given to the Red Cross in Gaza before being transported into Israel by troops and taken to the National Institute of Forensic Medicine for identification. So far, Hamas has returned the remains of 17 hostages since the start of the ceasefire, with 11 others still in Gaza and set to be turned over under the terms of the agreement. Meanwhile, officials in southern Gaza said Thursday that at least 40 people had been injured in overnight strikes, after Israel declared the ceasefire was in effect on Wednesday morning - Euronews
The world is experiencing a solar boom that has vastly outperformed expectations and tempered pessimism around climate change. Delegates will next month gather for the COP30 climate conference against a backdrop of progress, the Financial Times wrote: There is already four times as much solar capacity worldwide as analysts in 2010 forecast for 2035, and predictions of warming have fallen from 4°C to 2.6°C. But momentum is uneven. US support for solar has collapsed: Subsidies have been scrapped and permitting has become more difficult, even as other countries have raced ahead. That slower growth means that targets to triple global solar capacity by 2030 will probably be missed, and growing demand for energy means emissions are still rising - Semafor
Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport in southern China has opened its long-awaited Terminal 3 and a new runway on Thursday, marking a major expansion that cements its position among the world’s busiest air hubs. The additions bring the airport’s totals to three terminals and five runways, boosting its annual passenger capacity to 140 million and cargo capacity to 6 million metric tons. Officials said the additions will help the airport meet surging travel demand across the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, where annual passenger volume already exceeds 120 million - China Daily
The journals….
