Vatican Bank’s Ex-Chief Indicted Over $60 Million in Embezzlement Losses<br />Supported by By Reuters A former president of the Vatican bank has been ordered to stand trial on charges of embezzlement<br />and money laundering, the Vatican has said, making him the highest-ranking Holy See financial official to be indicted on charges tying him to losses of more than $61 million from real estate sales.<br />lawful conduct" by the three occurred from 2001 to 2008 during "the disposal of a considerable part of the institute’s real estate assets." It estimated damages at more than 50 million euros, or more than $61 million at current exchange rates,<br />and said that the bank would seek compensation. that un<br />In that order, Mr. Milano said the men had regularly underrepresented the proceeds from real estate sales in the Vatican bank’s official books.<br />Thousands of accounts were closed, and last year Italy put the Vatican on its "white list" of states with cooperative financial institutions, ending years of mistrust<br />and providing an endorsement of efforts by Pope Francis to clean up Vatican finances.<br />They were suspected of embezzling money while managing the sale of 29 buildings sold by the Vatican<br />bank, mainly to Italian buyers, from 2001 to 2008, according to a copy of the freezing order.<br />Moneyval, the monitoring body of the Council of Europe, has said in several evaluations<br />that while the Vatican has made great strides in cleaning up the I.O.R.
