Two people have been detained on suspicion of hacking and leaking confidential e-mails of Prince Albert II of Monaco. The leaks revealed that the monarch was involved in a conspiracy to misappropriate public funds for a personal real estate project.
One of the two suspects was a Belgian national named Frédéric C (59) from Liège. He was arrested by police in Paris and along with his accomplice, Didier G., accused of having been part of a plot to 'destabilise' the Monaco monarch and his entourage.
Videos uploaded on YouTube in September 2021 revealed that Prince Albert II, his chief of staff Laurent Anselmi and lawyer Thierry Lacoste, the head of Monaco's Constitutional Court Didier Lanotte, and accountant and property administrator Claude Palmero had been colluding on real estate projects in Monaco.
An investigation published in March 2022 by Le Monde compiled confidential documents, e-mails and messages of all four individuals, accusing them of misusing over €1 billion in public funds.
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Yet how did a Belgian businessman find himself entangled in a political and property plot to undermine the sovereign prince of a region over 750 kilometres from his hometown of Liège? According to France 3, both Frédéric C. and Didier G. were 'useful fools' in a larger scheme whose puppet master is Monaco property magnate Patrice Pastor.
Pastor comes from a powerful family in the principality; his father was in charge of most building projects in Monaco until Prince Albert II chose to delegate construction to other companies, upsetting Pastor.
According to various reports, Pastor also wants to change the way Monaco is run and could have orchestrated the hacking to "weaken the principality," as a source told France 3 and drum up support for a transition from a constitutional to a parliamentary monarchy.
However, Pastor has previously filed libel suits against two separate publications that linked him to the case. He has refuted any involvement in this particular plot, with police telling Le Journal du Dimanche that an investigation is ongoing.
