Prince Andrew claims medical condition means he doesn’t ‘sweat profusely’ and uses Pizza Express as ‘sex-slave’ alibi

SQUIRMING Prince Andrew last night went into astonishing personal detail to deny accusations he had sex with a teenage girl.

He claimed he was in a Pizza Express on the night he is accused of sleeping with Virginia Roberts, a “sex slave” of his paedo pal Jeffrey Epstein.

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The Duke also said a “peculiar medical condition” triggered by being shot at in the Falklands War meant he could not have “sweated profusely” — as she has claimed.

He appeared to suggest a photo of them at a friend’s flat in 2001 could have been faked. Asked about claims that they had sex, he said: “I can absolutely categorically tell you it never happened.”

In the interview shown on BBC2 last night, Andrew told Newsnight’s Emily Maitlis he did not regret his friendship with the late Epstein.

And he did not believe the scandal had affected the Queen’s standing — but said it had damaged his mental health.

It comes as the Duke's PR advisor Jason Stein confirmed he had resigned two weeks ago after warning Andrew not to do the car crash interview.

Roberts has claimed she met Andrew at London club Tramp before sleeping with him in 2001.

But Andrew, dad to Beatrice, 31, and Eugenie, 29, with ex-wife Sarah, said: “That couldn’t have happened because the date being suggested — the 10th of March — I was at home with the children.

“I’d taken Beatrice to a Pizza Express in Woking for a party at about 4 or 5 in the afternoon.

“And then because the Duchess was away, we have a simple rule in the family that when one is away the other is there.”

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The biggest takeaways from the Prince Andrew interview

• Epstein was invited to Windsor Castle as a ‘plus one’ for Ghislaine Maxwell
• Prince Andrew doesn’t regret his friendship with Epstein
• The royal regrets visiting the paedo in NYC in December 2010 and said he went to end his friendship – when the infamous photo was snapped
• The 59-year-old claims he was at a Pizza Express in Woking on the night Virginia Roberts alleges she had sex with him aged 17
• The prince claims he can’t sweat after Ms Roberts alleged he ‘sweat profusely’
• The Duke of York would testify under oath ‘if push came to shove’
• Prince Andrew described Epstein’s behaviour as ‘unbecoming’

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Asked why he could remember something so specific from 18 years ago, he added: “Because going to Pizza Express in Woking is a very unusual thing for me to do.

“I’ve never been . . . I’ve only been to Woking a couple of times and I remember it weirdly distinctly. As soon as somebody reminded me of it, I went, ‘Oh yes I remember that’.”

Virginia, now 35 and known as Virginia Giuffre, named Andrew in documents related to Epstein filed in Florida in 2015.

She said she was forced to have sex with the Duke at 17, which is under the age of consent in the state.

A judge later struck out her claims, saying they were “immaterial and impertinent”.

In the BBC2 interview, Maitlis described Virginia’s allegations that Andrew bought her drinks in Tramp, they had sex and he “sweated profusely”.

Andrew said: “I’ve no recollection of meeting her. In fact I’m convinced I was never in Tramp with her. There are a number of things wrong with that story, one of which is that I don’t know where the bar is in Tramp. I don’t drink.

“I don’t think I’ve ever bought a drink in Tramp.”

Ex-naval officer Andrew added: “There’s a slight problem with the sweating because I have peculiar medical condition which is that I don’t sweat, or didn’t at the time, because I had suffered an overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War when I was shot at . . . it was impossible for me to sweat.”

Sun doctor Carol Cooper said: “His claim that it’s due to adrenaline does sound a little odd.”

Virginia has claimed she was forced to have sex with Andrew three times between 1999 and 2002 — in ­London, New York and on Epstein’s private Caribbean island.

The Duke said he was on a date in Boston when Virginia said she was “trafficked” to him in New York.

Explaining why he was sure they never had sex, Andrew said: “Without putting too fine a point on it, if you’re a man it is a positive act to have sex with somebody.

“You have to have taken some sort of positive action so therefore if you try to forget it it’s very difficult to try and forget a positive action and I don’t remember anything. I can’t.

"I’ve racked my brains.” Asked if he had a message for his accuser, Andrew said: “I don’t because I have to have a thick skin.”

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The Duke was quizzed in Buckingham Palace’s south drawing room on Thursday. Maitlis also grilled him about the photo with Epstein in New York in 2010.

The disgraced financier had just served a sentence for soliciting an underage girl for prostitution.

Andrew said: “I went there with the sole purpose of saying to him because he had been convicted it was inappropriate for us to be seen together. I felt doing it over the phone was the chicken’s way out.

By mutual agreement during that walk in the park we decided we should part company.”

Andrew denied the Queen had any involvement in the decision.

Maitlis then asked why he spent four days at a house party in New York breaking off a friendship — and quizzed him as to whether he was seen as a “guest of honour” at Epstein’s home.

Andrew said: “It certainly wasn’t a party to celebrate his release. It was a small dinner party. I was doing other things when there . . . it was a convenient place to stay.”

'IT WAS A RAILWAY STATION'

When Maitlis asked about footage of young girls coming to the house while Andrew was there, he said: “I never saw them.

“You have to understand that his house, I described it as almost as a railway station in the sense that people were coming in and out all the time. What they were doing and why they were there I had nothing to do with.

“I only saw him (Epstein) for the dinner party, walk in the park, and probably passing in the passage.”

Epstein, 66, was found hanged in jail in August while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges.

Andrew said he did not regret the friendship, which started in 1999, as he met “useful” people through Epstein. The Duke said he only visited his pal “about four times”.

And he said Epstein could have hidden his predatory behaviour from him.

Andrew said: “If you’re somebody like me then people behave in a subtly different way. There were a lot of people walking around Jeffrey Epstein’s house. As far as I was aware, they were staff.”

His reaction to Epstein’s death was “shock” but he refused to comment on whether foul play, instead of suicide, played a part.

Andrew said he “kicks himself daily” over his decision to stay in contact with Epstein, and admitted he had “let the side down”.

Lawyers for Roberts have asked Andrew to travel to America to make a legal statement. The royal said: “If push came to shove and the legal advice was to do so, then I would be duty bound to do so.”

On his motivation for the TV interview, the Prince said: “It has been what I would describe as a constant sore in the family.

“We were all left with the same thing, what on earth happened, or how did he do it?”

He added: “I don’t believe it’s been damaging to the Queen. It has to me. It’s been a constant drip in the background.

"If I was in a position to be able to answer all these questions in a way that gave sensible answers that gave closure then I would love it.

“It’s almost a mental health issue to some extent in the sense it’s been nagging at my mind for a great many years.”

Mum-of-three Virginia now lives in Australia with her husband. Her publicist Dawn Schneider said: “We see this interview as a victory in the sense that Andrew has not talked publicly about this before.”

Sources close to Virginia said her legal team were arrowing in on the Prince’s “softer denial” that he could not remember meeting her.

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What Prince Andrew has said about the photo

'Those are my travelling clothes'

ANDREW says his clothes in the picture, supposedly taken at Ghislaine Maxwell’s Belgravia house in March 2001, were “travelling clothes” and not what he would wear on London nights out.

But The Sun on Sunday found pictures of him in near-identical attire on a 2001 night out in the capital.

'I didn't go upstairs at Ghislaine'

THE Prince claimed he had never been upstairs in Maxwell’s townhouse.

He said: “The photograph is taken upstairs and I don’t think I ever went upstairs in Ghislaine’s house.”

Asked if he was sure, he said: “Yeah, because the dining room and everything was on the ground floor.”

'I'm not one to, as it were, hug'

ANDREW doubts the picture is real because he does not usually hug in public.

The snap shows him with his arm wrapped around Virginia’s waist.

But he said that as a royal, hugs and “public displays of affection are not something that I do”.

'We can't be certain that it's my hand'

PALS have suggested that the hand around Virginia’s waist is not Andrew’s — as his fingers are chubbier.

He said: “That’s me, but whether that’s my hand or whether that’s the position I… we can’t be certain as to whether or not that’s my hand.”

'I've never seen him with a camera'

THE Duke also cast doubt on the picture by saying he had never seen Epstein “with a camera in my life”.

The sex offender is said to have taken the photo. Newsnight pointed out that Virginia has consistently claimed it was taken by Epstein on her Kodak.

'It's a photo of a photo of a photo'

THE Prince has cast doubt on the image, calling it a “photograph of a photograph of a photograph”.

But it is just a snap of Virginia’s original picture.

She is said to have given the original, along with 19 other images, to FBI investigators in 2011.

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