Newspaper headlines: Businesses 'cut ties' with Prince Andrew By BBC News

Staff Published duration 19 November 2019

As the fallout from Prince Andrew's Newsnight interview continues, the Sun reports that the revelations are taking their toll on the Queen, adding to what it calls her "annus horribilis 2".

It says the monarch is "struggling" without the Duke of Edinburgh - who is "living quietly" on the Sandringham Estate - and Prince Charles, who is on a tour of New Zealand.

The paper says the Royal Family is "driving off a cliff with no one at the wheel", and urges the Queen to "get a grip" before the family is damaged irreparably.

The Daily Telegraph has learned that a US judge is due to rule on whether to release new legal documents relating to Jeffrey Epstein, which will mention the duke by name.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post says charges will be brought as early as this week against two prison guards who were on duty on the night the US billionaire was found hanged in his cell. A preliminary investigation found "irregularities" with the logs, which indicated Epstein had been checked on regularly.

Striking scenes in Hong Kong

image copyright Reuters

Dramatic images of the Hong Kong university siege catch the eye: the Daily Telegraph shows two pro-democracy protesters staging what it calls a "desperate escape" from the Polytechnic University campus by abseiling off a motorway footbridge, to be picked up by motorcycles waiting below.

The Times front page shows a group of armed riot police wearing helmets and gas masks, cloaked in clouds of tear gas as they detain a young activist.

Its reporter at the scene, Richard Lloyd Parry, describes how a group of demonstrators tried to flee through a narrow side entrance, but were forced back by "volleys of tear gas and water cannon".

One 16-year-old boy trapped inside the building tells the paper his father is among the police officers waiting to arrest him.

The incoming police chief in Hong Kong, Chris Tang, tells the South China Morning Post that the territory's citizens have "turned a blind eye" to the violence of the protests, which he condemns as "close to terrorism". He accuses people of encouraging the activists with their "silence and tolerance" and denies that his officers have used excessive force in their response.

'Corbynquisition'

image copyright PA Wire

Several sketch writers are scathing about the efforts of Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and Liberal Democrats leader Jo Swinson to woo employers at the CBI conference.

Quentin Letts in The Times writes that the prime minister's anecdotes "tickled little gaiety from the suits", while the Labour leader "went down even worse".

The Guardian's John Crace disagrees, writing : "Corbyn was greeted with mere indifference. Which is to say he went down a storm compared with Johnson".

Michael Deacon, for the Daily Telegraph, says "all three were practically buried beneath an avalanche of tumbleweed" and notes that both "the corporate fat cat and the man in the street" appear to be "utterly bored out of their brains" with the election so far.

Bad news then as Mr Corbyn and Mr Johnson approach their first televised leadership debate, which is eagerly anticipated by the Sun . Under the headline "Corbynquisition", it sets out four questions that Mr Johnson has demanded his opponent answer on Tuesday night, challenging him to make his position clear on Brexit and immigration.

Elsewhere in politics, the Independent online issues a call to young people to register to vote, after discovering that 9.5 million eligible adults are missing from the electoral roll. It says that figure includes a third of teenagers. It says "everyone's voice should be heard" in an election which, it points out, will "decide the fate of Brexit and the country".

HuffPost UK reveals that Labour will make a manifesto pledge to investigate the legacies of British colonialism. The review, it says, will examine human rights abuses committed under "British imperial rule".

Attenborough on plastic

image copyright BBC NHU/Alex Board image caption Sir David is currently on our screens with the Seven Worlds, One Planet series

Sir David Attenborough reflects in the Times on his efforts to educate the world on the perils of plastic pollution, after being awarded the Chatham House prize for the "galvanizing impact" of his Blue Planet Two series.

"The funny thing is, I have been talking about plastic pollution in the sea for years," he tells the paper.

"Nobody took the slightest bit of notice."

He suggests the change in attitudes may be down to frustration with politicians' preoccupation with other issues, such as Brexit.

Emoji studies

Once the province of teenaged texters, the emoji is now such a factor of modern communication that it is reportedly being studied at several UK universities.

A linguistics lecturer quoted in the Sun and the Daily Telegraph describes the icons as a "serious area of study" that can be compared to hieroglyphs.

Courses on their use are being included in degrees in language, marketing, psychology and even politics, as parties increasingly use the symbols to appeal to voters.

Million dollar question

mystery unfolds in the i newspaper : the bundles of cash that have been found dotted around a former mining village in County Durham.

Residents of Blackhall Colliery have handed in 12 bundles of £20 notes, containing £2,000 each, which were left on pavements and roadsides.