Peter Mandelson refuses to apologise to ‘best pal’ Jeffrey Epstein’s victims

Months after being sacked as the UK’s ambassador to the United States following a series of revelations about his friendship with child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, Lord Mandelson has denied any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes.

The Labour peer, who was previously a high-profile figure in Tony Blair’s government, faced massive pressure after his contributions to Epstein’s notorious 50th birthday book were published in September.

In an interview on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, he told the BBC he had been ‘kept separate’ from the sexual side of Epstein’s life – because he was gay.

He also offered an apology to Epstein’s victims, saying: ‘I want to apologise to those women for a system that refused to hear their voices and did not give them the protection they were entitled to expect.

‘That system gave him protection and not them. If I had known, if I was in any way complicit or culpable, of course I would apologise for it. But I was not culpable; I was not knowledgeable of what he was doing.

‘I regret and will regret to my dying day the fact that powerless women, women who were denied a voice, were not given the protection they were entitled to expect.’

A timeline of Mandelson and Epstein’s ‘friendship’

One of the earliest examples of Mandelson’s closeness with Epstein comes in the form of a memo he wrote to Tony Blair in 2002, according to a report in the Times.

The newspaper said the note, in which Mandelson is said to have tried to arrange a meeting between his friend and the then-PM, was due to be released by the National Archives but it was blocked.

In 2003, when the notorious book was compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday, Mandelson appears to have provided no fewer than 10 pages.

In his entry, he described the New York financier as his ‘best pal’ and signed off by saying: ‘We love you!’

In 2006, Mandelson’s response to the news that Florida police are suggesting Epstein should be charged with four counts of unlawful sexual activity with a minor was to say he is ‘following you closely and here whenever you need’.

In 2007, after a plea deal was arranged between Epstein’s lawyers and Miami attorney Alexander Acosta to help him avoid prosecution, Mandelson and Epstein were pictured together celebrating a birthday at Epstein’s apartment in Paris.

An internal report by the bank JP Morgan from 2019 suggests Mandelson stayed at Epstein’s Manhattan apartment in June 2009 while he was in prison.

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