Spanish prelate arrested for leaking Vatican documents

The Vatican has arrested a Spanish prelate and a social media expert for allegedly stealing and leaking classified documents in the second such scandal to hit the secretive institution in three years.

Monsignor Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda, 54, who served on a special commission set up by Pope Francis to advise him on economic reform within the Vatican, was arrested along with a second member of the commission, Francesca Chaouqui.

The arrests were part of a several months-long investigation into the "misappropriation and disclosure of classified documents and information".

They followed Italian media reports at the weekend that Vatican police were investigating the attempted theft of a laptop belonging to Libero Milone, the head of the city state's new finance office.

Both Vallejo Balda and social media expert Chaouqui, 33, were arrested but Chaouqui was released by Vatican prosecutor Roberto Zannotti on Monday because she agreed to collaborate with investigators and was not considered a flight risk.

Chaouqui's appointment to the economic commission, which was handpicked by the pope, caused no little embarrassment in 2013 when it emerged she had been highly critical of the Vatican on Twitter.

Vallejo Balda, who is currently languishing in a Vatican jail, belongs to a priestly society linked to conservative Catholic movement Opus Dei, which expressed "surprise and pain" at his arrest.

A furious Vatican also denounced the expected publication this week of two new books believed to be based on leaks from hackers releasing information regarding the famously murky world of its finances.

And it referred to the last time employees aired the centuries-old institution's dirty laundry.

Caption: Representative image of St Peter's Basilica

Photo Credit: www.catholicnewsagency.com