Peter Andre has broken his silence on his custody war with ex Katie Price.
The 52-year-old took to Twitter overnight to say his silence “ends today”.
“For sixteen years, I have stayed silent in the face of repeated lies from my ex-wife and her family, out of respect for my children and loved ones, but staying silent has been incredibly frustrating,” he said. “That ends today.”
The Mysterious Girl singer went on to say the latest comments about his children’s “welfare and living arrangements” have forced him to “set the record straight”.
PETER ANDRE’S 16 YEAR BATTLE
“For well-documented reasons, Junior and Princess came into my care in 2018 and remained with me until they reached adulthood,” he explained.
“In 2019, the family court issued a legally binding order to enforce this arrangement,” he continued.
The father-of-two said he’s never made this public before “out of respect” for Junior, now 20, and Princess, now 18.
“In 2011 and 2015, publicly documented court cases, found my ex-wife had made false claims,” he wrote. “She was ordered to pay substantial damages and legal costs, and to apologise, to me and my management.
“The same falsehoods are being repeated today.
“Unfortunately, there are many more lies and baseless accusations I have yet to address. Those will now be dealt with in the coming months.”
KATIE HITS BACK
Katie has since responded to the claims via a statement made to The Sun.
“Kate is in a much better and clear headspace and is at peace with the situation,” the statement begins. “This was in the past and she doesn’t feel the need to bring up tit for tat comments, but more importantly she’s dealing with this the right way and it’s now in her lawyers hands.
“Kate will no longer be gaslighted and bullied as she once was…”
Peter’s statement comes after Katie spoke about her strained relationship with Princess, who is currently starring in her own reality show The Princess Diaries, on her latest episode of her podcast.
“I have not been allowed to go on any photoshoot, no signings or Superdrug openings or anything like that. Why? Because I’m not allowed and I’m not welcome,” she said on the podcast.
AT WAR OVER THE KIDS
“There’s no reason why both parents just can’t be there to support her. Now this isn’t about me. I have to clarify this,” she continued. “I don’t care that I’m not in Princess’s show.
“I don’t need to raise my profile by being on Princess’s show, I do enough stuff.
The 47-year-old continued, saying she just wants to be there to support her daughter.
“All what I want to do, is just whatever my daughter does, and it’s the same with Junior, I don’t care if I’m in the background, but I want to watch her do her photo shoots, I wanna watch her do her signings, because that’s what I did,” she said.
“And my mum and you and Nan used to come along and support, and I’m proud of her,” she continued. “And I just wanna be there with her because I now I feel that I’ve missed out on so much.”
She also told her listeners that Princess is currently living with her.
“We get on like best friends, mother and daughter. Princess lives with me and she stays at her dad’s. Now, she’s been staying at her dad’s the past two months because she’s been filming her show,” she said.
She later said that she actually ran into the show’s crew while she was in Ibiza.
“When I was in Ibiza, Princess was there in Ibiza and I wasn’t allowed to meet up with her but funny enough. I walked into a bar and there was a group of people, it was the producer of her show and they came up to me and said we are producing the show,” she said.
“I burst out crying, and this producer will know it, I said I’m so upset, it’s my daughter, I want to be involved but that side stops me. I was in tears. She saw how upset I was and I could see she was in a situation because she knows it’s right that I should be seen supporting my daughter and I’m not,” she continued.
“I don’t know where it’s going to go from here. It’s alright for them not to have me in the show, but I’m alright to be used for headlines for the show.”
Peter and Katie first met on the set of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! in 2004. Despite Katie having a boyfriend at the time, the pair grew close on the show.
A year after they left the jungle, they tied the knot at Highclere Castle in Hampshire and then launched their reality TV series, Katie & Peter.
The couple went on to welcome Junior in 2005 and Princess in 2007, before splitting in 2009.
For years, they were locked in a bitter custody battle with Katie publicly accusing Peter of not letting her see her children.
“I HATE him so much. I wish people knew what he is really like!” she wrote on Twitter at the time.
In her new reality TV series, Princess has admitted that she wishes she had a “happier childhood”.
“Mum was heartbroken and she went through a dark time and it was things kids shouldn’t see and when we needed our mum there, she wasn’t there because she had her own problems,” she said.
“I’m not healed or fully recovered from it but mum has fixed herself compared to how she was back then.”
