London's Metropolitan Police arrested former British Ambassador to the United States Peter Mandelson on Monday on suspicion of misconduct in public office stemming from his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

"Officers arrested a 72-year-old man on suspicion of misconduct in public office. He was detained at a residence in Camden on Monday, February 23, and has been taken to a London police station for questioning," a police spokesperson stated in a brief communiqué.

The arrest followed several search warrants executed at Mandelson's residences in Camden, in north London, and in Wiltshire, a county in the west of the British capital. The former ambassador has dismissed the allegations against him as "false."

Mandelson's appointment in December 2024 placed British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in a difficult position. Starmer was compelled to issue a public apology for taking Mandelson at his word, stating he had been unaware of "the depth, scale, and extent" of his relationship with Epstein.

Mandelson, a former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and onetime Chief Secretary to the Treasury under Prime Minister Tony Blair, was removed from his diplomatic post in September after numerous emails surfaced linking him to Epstein. He subsequently left the Labour Party in early February.

The U.S. Department of Justice released more than three million files related to the Epstein case on January 30. Among those documents, three payments of $25,000 each were made to Mandelson between 2003 and 2004 from accounts held by the late financier at JP Morgan Chase.

Mandelson, a former European Commissioner for Trade, is under investigation for allegedly disclosing sensitive information to Epstein regarding the eurozone's 500-billion-euro bailout package in 2010, during his tenure as a minister under then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The released files, which include intimate correspondence between Mandelson and Epstein, contain a photograph of the former British minister in his underwear alongside a woman whose face has been obscured. The documents also reveal that Mandelson stayed at Epstein's Manhattan residence in 2009 while Epstein was serving a sentence under house arrest for soliciting prostitution from a minor.

The scandal has also claimed the political career of Morgan McSweeney, the Prime Minister's chief of staff and the individual responsible for Mandelson's appointment. Other senior officials, including communications director Tim Allan and Cabinet Secretary Chris Wormald, have also tendered their resignations.