LONDON — Royal officials on Friday denied that Britain's Prince Andrew engaged in any “impropriety with underage minors” after he was named in U.S. court documents related to a lengthy lawsuit against American financier Jeffrey Epstein.

In papers filed to a Florida court, an unidentified woman alleged that Epstein forced her to have sex with Prince Andrew in London, New York and on a private Caribbean island owned by Epstein when she was under the age of 18. The filing said the alleged encounters took place around 1999 to 2002.

Buckingham Palace said in a statement: “This relates to longstanding and ongoing civil proceedings in the United States, to which the Duke of York is not a party. As such we would not comment on the detail.” Andrew, 54, is known as the Duke of York.

The statement added: “However, for the avoidance of doubt, any suggestion of impropriety with underage minors is categorically untrue.” The statement was unusual because royal officials typically do not comment on such allegations.

PANGKALAN BUN, Indonesia — Indonesian officials were hopeful Saturday that they were honing in on the wreckage of AirAsia Flight 8501 after sonar equipment detected two large objects on the ocean floor, nearly a week after the plane went down in stormy weather.Teams equipped with a remote-operated vehicle were battling high waves and strong currents as they tried to capture images of the suspected chunks of the plane for confirmation, said Henry Bambang Soelistyo, chief of the National Search and Rescue Agency.An Indonesian navy ship detected the objects early Friday, and searchers later zoomed in with a Geological Survey vessel to take dimensionsOne of the objects was measured at 31 feet by 15 feet and half a 20 inches high. The other, found nearby, was 24 feet by 20 inches.