Europe's Smallest Countries: - MONACO

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                     Prince Albert II Of Monaco Formally Acknowledges Illegitimate Biracial Son.





Date: 8/15/2005
 
In a recent statement Prince Albert II of Monaco officially recognized paternity of a boy born to
a Black French-Togolese woman almost two years ago, automatically bestowing on the child the eventual rights as an heir to a billion-dollar fortune, but not to the throne, according to reports.

In the statement, the recently crowned prince said he "has and will continue to face up to his responsibilities" after having fathered the child with Nicole Coste, a former flight attendant whom he met in July 1997 on an Air France flight to Paris from the French Riviera, reports the New York Times.

When speaking of his son the prince told French television, "This child will never want for anything," reports People magazine. He also said that the boy is "totally part of my private life."

According to the paper, Prince Albert, 47, who assumed royal powers in April upon the death of this father, Prince Rainer III, is now expected to register as the father of 23-month-old Alexandre, making the boy his heir under French law. The law liberalized several years ago to give equal rights to so-called "natural" offspring born to unmarried adults.

Article 10 of Monaco's constitution specifies that only "direct and legitimate" descendants can assume the throne-which would exclude Alexandre. The boy could yet become an heir to the Grimalidi throne if the family decides it is in its interest, reports the Times. For now he is simply on track to becoming very wealthy. Technically the prince's successor is now his sister Princess Caroline, 48.

Scandal is nothing new to the royal family. According to the Times, the prince's sister, Princess Stephanie, 40, has had three children out of wedlock, and his grandmother was the daughter of Prince Louis II of Monaco and a North African laundry worker. The grandmother was not recognized as Prince Louis' daughter until she was 13 and did not become an heir to the throne until she was 21.

Coste, 33, and the prince had a love affair that lasted several years until, according to her, Prince Albert's father intervened, said the Times. Coste, the mother of two other children from a previous marriage, decided to go public after Prince Albert had acknowledged his paternity to her after a DNA test but had never given her papers to support her claim.

To care for the child Coste is given a reported $12,000 a month in financial support. The prince has also deeded a $2.5 million house in the South of France to the child, according to People. The magazine also said that Costa "feels a tremendous sense of relief" now that the matter is settled,
and that "she got what she wanted, and she's glad it's over."

If Alexandre is the sole heir upon his father's death, by law he will automatically inherit half of Prince Albert's estate. The law prevents parents from disinheriting their children.

According to the Times, Prince Albert's fortune, consisting primarily of real estate, is worth more than $1 billion and could be close to $2 billion.


http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-135282810.html

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                                        Prince Albert Admits to Illegitimate Child





By Stephen M. Silverman
Originally posted
Thursday June 01, 2006

Monaco's Prince Albert II – who last year officially recognized a toddler son he'd fathered with a Togolese flight attendant – has now acknowledged a second child born out of wedlock:

a 14-year-old girl living in California.

The unmarried Albert, 48, "officially recognizes a paternity that was legally established a few weeks ago," his lawyer, Thierry Lacoste, is quoted as saying in an interview with French newspaper Le Figaro published Thursday.

According to the Associated Press, Lacoste also said that Albert had intended to keep his parentage of Jazmin Grace Rotolo secret until she reached adulthood, but "the situation had become untenable for her" in recent weeks as speculation about the identity of her father increased.

The bloodline of the teen, who lives in Palm Desert, Calif., was hinted at Wednesday by the Palm Springs newspaper The Desert Sun, which reported that Rotolo's 1992 Riverside County birth certificate identifies her father as Albert Alexandre Louis Pierre Grimaldi of Monaco.

The royal palace refused to comment to The Desert Sun, calling the matter a private affair of the prince.

French media reports have said Albert had a brief affair with the girl's mother, former waitress Tamara Rotolo, in 1991 when she vacationed on the French Riviera.

The Desert Sun said it was unable to reach Tamara, but Lacoste said Jazmin is welcome in Monaco – though she cannot take the throne and will not bear the Grimaldi family name.

The same holds true for Albert's other out-of-wedlock child, 3-year-old Alexandre.

Albert's late parents were Prince Rainer III and American movie star Grace Kelly.


http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,1199760,00.html

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                                              Children born out of wedlock






Jazmin Grace Grimaldi



In 1992, a California woman, Tamara Rotolo, filed a paternity suit against the prince, claiming that he was the father of her daughter, whom she named Jazmin Grace Grimaldi. Prince Albert was also listed as the father on the child's Riverside County, California, birth certificate.[5] and the child was legally surnamed Grimaldi. However, the case, which went to trial in 1993, eventually was dismissed by Superior Court Judge Graham Anderson Cribbs, who claimed that there was "insufficient contact between Albert and the state of California to justify hearing a suit there"[6] agreeing with an assertion by the prince's lawyer, Stanley Arkin, that the California court had no jurisdiction.

In court documents and legal depositions, Case#IND78459 in Riverside County Superior Court Family Law Division under Superior Court Judge Graham Anderson Cribbs, Prince Albert admitted that he had been with Tamara Rotolo, who was traveling with friend, Barbara Welker (per her deposition filed with the court), in Monaco on "a couple of occasions" in July 1991. (The child had been born approximately nine months later, on 4 March 1992.) As reported by a local newspaper covering the case, "Arkin asserted that the Riverside County court had no jurisdiction in the case since the romantic encounter supposedly occurred in Monaco and Albert has had no contacts with California that relate to the issues in the suit."[2]

On 31 May 2006, after DNA test results confirmed the child's parentage, Prince Albert admitted, in a statement from his lawyer, that he is Jazmin's father. He also extended an invitation for the girl to study and live in Monaco.

According to Le Figaro, Jazmin Grace Grimaldi is "mature, sweet and intelligent" and an honor student at St. Margaret's Episcopal School. Per the school website, she is currently enrolled in a private school in the San Juan Capistrano, California area and resides in San Juan Capistrano, California.





Alexandre Coste



In May 2005, Nicole Coste, a former Air France flight attendant from Togo, claimed that her youngest son, whom she calls Alexandre Éric Stéphane Coste, is Prince Albert's son, proven by DNA tests conducted by Swiss technicians working on orders from the Monegasque government. She further claimed the prince had signed a notarized certificate confirming paternity but that she had not received a copy of it. The French weekly Paris Match published a ten-page interview with Coste and included photographs of the prince holding and feeding the child. Coste also told Paris Match that she was living in the prince's Paris apartment and receiving an allowance from him while pretending to be the girlfriend of one of his friends in order to maintain privacy. She also said that the prince had last seen the boy in February 2005. A spokesman for Prince Albert had no comment, though upon news of Coste's claims, the prince's lawyer, Thierry Lacoste, announced that "A judicial strategy will be determined within the next few days."

In mid-May 2005, Lacoste announced that as a result of the international publicity over the revelations of the prince's son, Prince Albert is suing the Daily Mail, Bunte, and Paris Match for delving too deeply into his private life.

On 6 July 2005, a few days before he was enthroned on 12 July, Albert II officially confirmed via his lawyer Thierry Lacoste that the 22-month-old was his biological son.[7]





Additional paternity suit



An earlier paternity suit, brought by Bea Fiedler, a German topless model whom the Daily Telegraph described as a "sex-film star", reportedly was dismissed. A blood test, which was refused by the judge, did not prove that the prince was the father of Fiedler's son, Daniel.[8]

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                                                     Succession issues





As Rainier III's health declined, his son's lack of legitimate children became a matter of public and political concern, as to the legal and international consequences if Albert were to die without lawful heirs. Prior to 2002, Monaco's constitution specified that only the last reigning prince's "direct and legitimate" male descendants could inherit the crown.

On 2 April 2002 Monaco promulgated Princely Law 1.249 which provides that if a reigning prince dies without surviving legitimate issue, the throne passes to his siblings and their descendants of both sexes, according to the principle of male-preference primogeniture.[10] In October 2005, (after Albert's accession to the throne) this law took full effect when ratified by France, pursuant to the 2002 Franco-Monégasque Treaty regulating relations between the Sovereign Principality and its powerful neighbour. His sisters and their legitimate children thereby acquired the right to succeed to the throne.

Albert's illegitimate son Eric, or daughter, Jazmin, might acquire claims to the throne ahead of all others currently in the order of succession if Monaco's constitution were changed to that effect. In Eric Alexandre's case, he would also be legitimated and automatically become Monaco's heir apparent under current law if Albert were to marry Eric's) mother in a fully dynastic (i.e., non-morganatic) marriage. But in a 2005 exchange with U.S. interviewer Larry King, Albert stated that this will not happen.

Albert's marrying Jazmin's mother would probably not legitimate her nor grant her a place in the line of succession, as she would likely be considered an adulterous child. The man to whom Jazmin's mother had been married since 1987, David Schumacher, filed for a divorce from Ms Rotolo on 13 September 1991 in California, according to a San Diego Union-Tribune article by Jeff Wilson of the Associated Press, citing as grounds "irreconcilable differences". Ms Rotolo did not contest the petition, the couple having been separated since April 1989.

Albert specified that neither of these children is eligible for the throne in statements confirming his paternity.   As of November 2007, his eldest sister, Princess Caroline, remains first in the line of succession to the Monegasque throne. Though she is only the heiress-presumptive and not heiress-apparent, Caroline is the Hereditary Princess of Monaco, according to the Grimaldi house law.

Until Albert II should have legitimate descendants born of a recognized dynastic marriage, Caroline's eldest son, Andrea Casiraghi, is second in succession to the throne.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_II,_Prince_of_Monaco