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LONDON<\/strong> \u2013 Documents show Queen Elizabeth II was \u201cvery keen\u201d that the former Prince Andrew be given the job of UK trade envoy.<\/p>\n The U.K. government on Thursday released the confidential papers related to Andrew\u2019s appointment, just months after lawmakers accused the king\u2019s brother of putting his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein<\/a> ahead of the nation.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Queen is very keen that the Duke of York should take on a prominent role in the promotion of national interests,\u201d the head of Britain\u2019s trade body wrote in a letter. <\/p>\n Another document, a government memo sent to U.K. trade staff around the world, says that \u201cHRH\u2019s high public profile\u201d will require \u201ccareful and sometimes strict media management,\u201d in a reference to Andrew.<\/p>\n The involvement of the late queen will confirm previously held beliefs that the monarch held a soft spot for her son \u2014 an empathy that might have influenced her lack of decisiveness in dealing with allegations of Andrew\u2019s connection to Epstein.<\/p>\n Mountbatten-Windsor was stripped of his royal title last year as King Charles III<\/a> tried to insulate the monarchy from the growing fallout from the Epstein scandal. The former prince served as a special envoy for international trade from 2001 to 2011, when he was forced to give up the role because of concerns about his links to questionable figures in Libya and Azerbaijan.<\/p>\n The move followed the U.S. Justice Department\u2019s release of millions of pages of documents related to Epstein.<\/a> Those files showed how the wealthy financier used an international web of rich, powerful friends to gain influence and sexually exploit young women and girls.<\/p>\n Nowhere has the fallout from the document release been felt more strongly than in the U.K., where the scandal has raised questions about the way power is wielded by the aristocracy, senior politicians and influential business owners, known collectively as \u201cthe Establishment.\u201d <\/p>\n