Vatican Raid on Secretariat of State a Portent of Things to Come? by Edward Pentin

ANALYSIS: Sources tell the Register that this week’s investigative actions are primarily targeted at Vatican officials who are no longer working at the secretariat.

By Edward Pentin, National Catholic Register, 10/4/19 

VATICAN CITY — A police raid on offices in the Vatican Secretariat of State, the suspension of five Vatican officials, and the appointment of a leading Italian anti-mafia magistrate as head of the Vatican’s criminal tribunal have sparked intense speculation about the extent of financial corruption in the Holy See.

Vatican prosecutors seized documents, computers, telephones and passports and blocked bank accounts in Tuesday’s raid on the administrative section of the Vatican Secretariat of State, the Church’s central governing body.

The Vatican’s Financial Information Authority (AIF), which is the Vatican’s anti-money-laundering watchdog, was also raided.

A Vatican statement on Tuesday said the promoter of justice of Vatican City Court, Gian Piero Milano, and Alessandro Diddi, adjunct promoter of justice, ordered the search after complaints in early summer from the Institute for Religious Works (IOR) — commonly called the Vatican Bank — and the Office of the Auditor General about financial transactions “carried out over time.”

According to Italian media reports, those transactions revolve around expensive property deals, primarily a 2013 multimillion-dollar real estate transaction in London’s prestigious Mayfair district, which is said to have taken significant losses. ….

Read more at  http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/vatican-raid-on-secretariat-of-state-a-portent-of-things-to-come