MONACO - Monaco`s prime minister on Thursday rejected fresh accusations that the wealthy Mediterranean statelet was a money laundering haven, as the principality prepared for the funeral next week of its veteran ruler Prince Rainier.
"I find this shocking and inelegant because it is taking advantage of the attention which Monaco is currently receiving" because of the prince`s death, said Patrick Leclercq, whose official title is Minister of State.
Monaco does not appear on any list drawn up by international financial institutions of states suspected of harbouring dirty money, he told AFP.
The accusations were made earlier Friday by a French Socialist deputy, who was a member of a parliamentary committee that in 2000 concluded that Monaco was a place "conducive to money laundering."
The charges came as Monaco, a two-square-kilometre state wedged between the foothills of the Alps and the Mediterranean Sea, mourned Prince Rainier, who died Wednesday at the age of 81 after battling heart, lung and kidney problems.
Rainier brought Hollywood glamour to Monaco when in 1956 he married the American film star Grace Kelly.
"The marriage of the debonair ruler to the dazzling American actress, one of the first `weddings of the century,` helped revive the fortunes of the principality of 32,000 people," said Thursday`s Washington Post.
"Close to bankruptcy at the time, Monaco experienced an infusion of transatlantic glamour, not to mention increased tourism and investment," it added.
But the prince`s demise was overshadowed by the preparations a few hundred kilometres (miles) further along the Mediterranean coast for the funeral Friday of Pope John Paul II, with millions of Roman Catholics converging on Rome.
Even the French press failed to get over-excited by the death of the world`s second longest-reigning monarch after the king of Thailand.
The daily Le Figaro, along with France Soir and Aujourd`hui en France, featured it as their top story, but Le Monde and Liberation gave it just a passing mention on their front pages, according the death of the US writer Saul Bellow equal prominence.
At the Monaco palace, perched atop a high promontory overlooking a port full of luxury yachts, e-mail messages of condolence from around the world were arriving by the thousands, an official said.
Mourners laid bouquets of flowers in the square in front of the palace, while some shops remained closed, and state workers wore dark suits to their offices.
The red-and-white Monegasque flag -- omnipresent on streets and in shops -- was furled and tied with a black ribbon,
The funeral of Rainier, a father figure who dominated the lives of Monegasques since he ascended the throne in 1949, will be held in the principality`s cathedral on April 15.
Rainier, who will be succeeded by his 47-year-old bachelor son Albert who took over as regent on March 31, will then be interred in the crypt next to his beloved wife, who died in a car crash 23 years ago.
Rainier`s body will lie for a few days in a private chapel in the palace before being carried to the town`s 19th-century cathedral for the lying in state that begins on Sunday.
But unlike the millions who queued for hours to pay their last respects to the pope, only Monaco residents and foreign dignitaries will be able to file past Rainier`s coffin.
The funeral next Friday will also be a similarly low-key affair, officials said.
Monaco has declared a three-month mourning period through July 6 for members of the royal family and household -- half that accorded to Princess Grace -- with one month for civil servants.
But the principality`s Grand Prix motor race will go ahead as planned in May, and next week`s international tennis tournament will also not be affected.
Monaco`s fabled casino, where for the last century and a half the world`s wealthy have come to gamble, reopened Thursday after closing for 24 hours after Rainier`s death.
The Grimaldi royal family got more bad news Thursday after it was announced that Prince Ernst-August of Hanover, the husband of Rainier`s daughter Caroline, was hospitalised in the principality to be treated for infections linked to his pancreas.
04/07/2005 17:49 GMT