VATICAN CITY
euronews
By Philip Pullella
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Don’t even think of calling Ernst von Freyberg, the president of the Vatican bank, God’s New Banker.
“I don’t appreciate incorrect and silly descriptions,” he said with a smile in his Vatican office, shrugging off a nickname that some have given him since he assumed his post four months ago.
Still, von Freyberg talks like he is on a mission from God: to clean up the murky image of the bank and steer it to total transparency and compliance with international standards on fighting terrorism financing, money laundering and tax evasion.
The European anti-money laundering committee, Moneyval, said in a July report that the bank, formally known as the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR), still had some way to go and von Freyberg said he is taking the challenge very personally.
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