Mandelson refuses to say sorry for links to Epstein

LABOUR faces fresh demands to boot Peter Mandelson out of the Lords after he refused to apologise to victims over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein.

- BY MARTYN BROWN Political Editor

The former US ambassador and cabinet minister had previously described the convicted paedophile as his “best pal”.

Offered the chance to say sorry to the victims for his association with Epstein the peer refused, saying he would apologise only for “a system” which let them down.

Speaking in his first interview since being sacked as the UK’s ambassador to the US, the Labour grandee told BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg show: “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.”

Pressed on whether he would apologise for his friendship with Epstein after the financier’s conviction, Lord Mandelson said: “If I had known, if I was in any way complicit or culpable, of course I would apologise. But I was not culpable, I was not knowledgeable for what he was doing.