An aide to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor advised Jeffrey Epstein to illegally hide his child sexual abuse conviction to obtain a visa to China, according to the latest Epstein files release.

David Stern, who was a close associate of both Epstein and the then prince, was asked for his help after the disgraced financier’s initial application for a visa was rejected.

Stern advised Epstein’s assistant to make the application at the Chinese embassy in Paris and “in addition it will be better not to tick the boxes re being denied previously or criminal charges”.

Stern added in the email chain of 2012: “Whether or not to do this should be J’s decision of course and not mine.”

Epstein was given an 18-month jail sentence in the US in 2008 after pleading guilty to soliciting girls as young as 14.

There is no suggestion that Mountbatten-Windsor knew of Stern’s advice and it does not appear that Epstein made the planned visit to Beijing.

Stern, 48, was a fixer to Mountbatten-Windsor from about 2010 and a director of his Pitch@Palace business between 2016 and 2019. He was also close to Epstein, describing him as his mentor.

Stern had proposed a year earlier that he and Epstein set up an investment office in Beijing for “high net worth individuals” and “very discreetly make PA part of it and use his ‘aura and access’”.

PA is the abbreviation regularly used by Stern and Epstein in correspondence contained within the 3m documents released by the US Department of Justice relating to the disgraced American financier, who killed himself in his cell in 2019.

It is unclear whether the idea for a Beijing office was developed but an email from the 23 June 2012 suggests the three men did conspire further about working together in Asia. Stern, a German national now believed to be living in the United Arab Emirates, wrote to Epstein that there were two options open to them.

The first would be to launch a company called the Serpentine group, which would be a “new company for this purpose only”. The second was to use Stern’s company Asia Gateway, which “has history and accounts and prove (sic) of clients in the past and can be used”.

Stern said he had “informed PA that you are thinking about the company set up and I will wait for your feedback before taking action … He replied that I should at least send the letter so we can proceed … I will wait for your instruction.”

Epstein responded: “Send asia gateway.”

Stern wrote back: “Understood and confirmed: it will be done as Asia Gateway. PA agrees to your decision. Letter will be send (sic) as below.”

In the letter to Mountbatten-Windsor of which the royal was seemingly already aware, Stern wrote that Asia Gateway was an advisory firm based in South Kensington that focuses on “developing, structuring and investing in a wide range of projects, specifically connected to the United Kingdom”.

It says: “My deep admiration for your relentless work as the UK’s special representative for international trade and investment serves as inspiration to the AG business model. Knowing your commitment to the UK and its trade and businesses I wonder if there is not more that could be done to establish a business network of unrivalled comparison.

“Additionally and based on my thirteen years of business experience with China, AG aims to attract Chinese investors and companies to the UK market and relevant opportunities. I know this is an area of opportunity for the UK as a whole and is a priority for the UK government. I would be most honoured to discuss this approach with you personally and to understand, if it were possible, how AG can support your crucial work.”

Stern and Mountbatten-Windsor have been approached for comment.

Thames Valley police are liaising with prosecutors and examining material in the Epstein files in relation to allegations related to “misconduct in public office” by Mountbatten-Windsor.

The former prince is alleged to have leaked confidential information to Epstein, including official reports of trips to Singapore, Hong Kong and Vietnam in 2010 and 2011 when he was a government trade envoy. Trade envoys have a duty of confidentiality.

According to the police, officers are seeking “to determine whether a criminal offence is suspected and whether a full investigation is required”.

The former British ambassador to the US Peter Mandelson faces an investigation relating to the same alleged offence, which carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

Both men have denied any wrongdoing.

The government’s “inheritance tax raid” on pensions has helped drive sales of retirement annuities to new highs.

Industry data this week revealed they enjoyed a “record-breaking” 2025, with sales growing by 4% to £7.4bn and the average amount invested in an annuity surpassing £80,000 for the first time.

Some of this enthusiasm for what many people traditionally viewed as a dull, poor value product, has been put down to people who are keen to ensure that no more of their cash than is necessary ends up in the hands of HM Revenue and Customs. In addition, many are seeking some certainty in turbulent times.

An annuity is a product that converts an individual’s pension pot into a regular, guaranteed income for the rest of their life (or for a fixed term). They pay a life insurance company a lump sum, and, in exchange, it guarantees a regular payout.

Demand plummeted after the “pension freedoms” introduced in 2015 meant people no longer had to take one out. But changes to inheritance tax (IHT) on pensions announced by Rachel Reeves in her October 2024 budget helped give them a new lease of life.

She said money left in a defined contribution (AKA money purchase) pension after someone’s death will be pulled into the IHT net from April 2027. All private pensions, and most workplace schemes, are defined contribution.

The changes mean “unused” pension savings could be taxed as part of someone’s estate if they exceed the IHT threshold. Unused funds are money in a pension pot that has not been used to claim an income – such as buying an annuity.

Commenting on the data issued by the Association of British Insurers, Clare Moffat at the insurer Royal London said: “With changes next year to inheritance tax and pensions, there has been an increased interest in using annuities for IHT planning.”

Annuities now also offer better value than they used to. Marianna Hunt at the investment firm Fidelity International said its recent data showed that a 66-year-old in good health with a £300,000 pension pot could buy a single-life annuity paying £22,440 a year – a rate of about 7.5%.

“Five years ago, rates were closer to 4%to 5%, delivering roughly £13,500 from the same pot. That’s a substantial uplift in guaranteed income,” she added.

David Keohan surveyed the County Waterford beach and spotted a familiar mound half-buried in sand: an oval-shaped limestone boulder. It weighed about 115kg.

He wedged it loose with a crowbar, wiped it dry with a cloth, dusted his hands with chalk and paused to gaze at the Irish Sea, as if summoning strength from the waves pounding ashore.

He hunkered down, gripped the boulder and hoisted it to his lap. Legs trembling, Keohan straightened his knees and hoisted the weight up to his chest, close enough to kiss it. Two seconds later he lowered and dropped the boulder, which thudded back on to the sand.

It was a demonstration of the ancient sport of stone lifting. Keohan has almost single-handedly revived the practice in Ireland and helped stir global interest.

“It’s not just about strength. Every single lifting stone has an amazing story attached to it,” said Keohan, 47. “It’s opened up a whole culture that was lost.”

To his fanbase Keohan is better known by his Instagram handle Indiana Stones. On there, he is a scholarly Hercules who parses myth, folklore and literature to locate boulders around Ireland that for centuries were used to test strength and bond communities.

Some were lifted at funeral games to honour the dead, some to celebrate harvest festivals and some to mark a chieftain’s ascension, said Keohan. “One stone was almost like a job interview to become a stonemason – you had to be strong enough to lift it.”

To lift a designated stone – some weighed up to 170kg – a few inches above the ground was known as “getting the wind under it”, said Keohan. “That was a great day in a young man’s life. If you lift it to your knees, you’re a champion. Lift it up to your chest, you are a phenomenon of strength and spoken about for generations to come.”

He has identified 53 lifting stones, spanning beaches, fields and graveyards, and hopes to locate dozens more. To lift such a stone today is to connect with all those who previously managed the feat, a continuum that in some cases stretches back millennia, said Keohan. “Isn’t that amazing?”

Few in Ireland had heard of the sport until Keohan stumbled into it.

When Covid restrictions shut gyms in 2020, the former kettlebell lifting champion started using stones in his garden as weights. Galvanised by documentaries about stone lifting in Scotland, Iceland and the Basque region, he made a post-Covid “pilgrimage” to the 127kg Fianna stone in Scotland. “It was strength, mythology, history. I fell in love with it.”

After reading Liam O’Flaherty’s 1937 short story The Stone, about an elderly man who tries to lift the “manhood stone” of his youth, Keohan tracked down a pink-tinged granite lump that matched the story’s description on the Atlantic island of Inishmore, where O’Flaherty grew up.

Now, a sport that was all but forgotten boasts a devoted following on Instagram and TikTok, and a competition organised by a group called Irish Stone Monsters. The ride-sharing company Lyft has sponsored a stone lifting studio at a Dublin gym.

Enthusiasts trek to remote rural areas to try to lift designated stones. A stone in County Clare named after Mrs Kildea, a possibly apocryphal figure who reputedly lifted an enormous boulder, has inspired women to take part. Last year a boulder known as Cloch Bán, or White Stone, was shipped to enthusiasts in Boston.

Stone lifting practices existed across Europe, Asia and Africa, said Conor Heffernan, a cultural historian at Ulster University. The legend of the warrior Finn McCool creating a path to Scotland by laying basalt columns in the sea – the Giant’s Causeway – illustrates Ireland’s connection to its rocky landscape, said Heffernan. “Most of our surviving memory is either oral histories or texts that were collected from the 1800s onwards.”

Stone lifting in Ireland was on occasion a proxy for colonial rebellion, said Heffernan. “There’s a famous story where the Catholics in a community find the strongest Catholic man to lift a stone that no Protestant can.”

Keohan and Heffernan are seeking to get stone lifting included in Ireland’s inventory of intangible cultural heritage – a first step to Unesco recognition.

Guided by local lore, the National Folklore Collection, and tips from Instagram followers, Keohan has found dozens more stones around Ireland. “This dam burst of information came out,” he said. “It has given me purpose and a reattachment to what it means to be Irish. I’m just showing people the story and to me that has become more important than the actual lifting.”

The father of three, who works at a construction depot in Waterford, has tapped into a passion for Irish culture that has also boosted the Irish language, road bowling and TikTok’s #GaelTok content.

Keohan has written a forthcoming book, The Wind Beneath the Stone. “I have this mad double life where I’m still working the same job during the week but at weekends I could be anywhere.”

When he was nicknamed Indiana Stones, Keohan embraced the moniker. His application to do a PhD could burnish it. “Yeah,” he grinned, “Dr Indiana Stones.”