Old News About Queen Paola’s Father Makes Headlines
Don Fulco Ruffo di Calabria, the father of Queen Paola of The Belgians is making headlines in Belgium due to a book by Prof. Mark Van den Wijngaert, journalist Misjoe Verleyen and Lieve Beullens, that will be published this week. In the book ‘Vrouwen naast de troon’ the authors ‘reveal’ that Paola’s father was a senator from 1934 till 1944, during the time Mussolini’s fascist party was in power. Don Fulco, who was a hero from WWI, was put on trial in 1945 and found guilty for co-responsibility for the crimes of Fascism.
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The authors presented this ‘revelation’ as big news, and they claim that it was never mentioned before in official biographies. Dutch royalty blog ‘royalblog’ however quickly pointed out that the 1999 biography of Queen paola by mario Danneels already mentions that her father was a senator during this period, as do Italian online biographies about the prince. He was named a senator by kign Vittorrio Emanuele III of Italy in 1934, the king already elevated him to the princely rank years earlier.
However, the Belgian newspaper now claim that the prince wass a senator for the fascist party and a great supporter of Mussolini. Thus far no evidence of this has been presented anywhere in the press and the authors of the book never said this in interviews either. Still, theyw ill be happy about the headlines, as most people in Belgium will know that their new book will be available for sale this week.
