Court orders former Belgian King to take DNA test or risk fine

Belgian court orders former King Albert II to pay €5K a DAY until he takes a DNA test to resolve a long-running paternity dispute with a woman claiming to be his daughter

  • King Albert II, country’s former monarch has never denied claims of a love child
  • The Belgian royal was ordered by the Brussels court to provide DNA samples
  • Artsist Delphine Boel, 46, has been trying to establish paternity for years 
  • If case was successful Boel would be 15th in line for the Belgian throne

A Belgian appeals court has ruled that the country’s former monarch, must pay €5,000 for each day that he refuses to provide DNA in a case brought by a woman who claims to be his love child. 

King Albert II, 84, was ordered by the Brussels court to attend an appointment and provide a DNA sample in the presence of a justice official. He will be fined for each day he fails to respect that appointment. 

Artist Delphine Boel, 46, has been trying to establish paternity for years and her story has often made headlines.

Albert has never publicly denied being her father but has refused to provide DNA despite a November court order to do so.

If Boel’s case was successful, she would be 15th in line for the Belgian throne. 

King Albert II, 84, was ordered by the Brussels court to attend an appointment and provide a DNA sample in the presence of a justice official

Artist Delphine Boel, 46, has been trying to establish paternity for years and her story has often made headlines

In November last year the court ruled that King Albert must provide the DNA which came as a surprise after a lower court ruled Delphine Boel could not rely on such forensic evidence to establish paternity.  

Boel claims that King Albert II had an affair with her mother Sybille de Selys Longchamps.

The ruling gave Albert three months to provide a DNA sample which would be used to determine if he was Ms Boel’s father. 

Boel started court proceedings in 2014 and her lawyer Alain De Jonge at the time said that his client is not motivated by money as she is a member of a major Belgian industrial family worth $1 billion.

In November last year the court ruled that King Albert must provide the DNA which came as a surprise after a lower court ruled Delphine Boel could not rely on such forensic evidence to establish paternity

Boel’s case came to light in 1999 with the publication of a biography of Queen Paolo, Albert’s Italian wife. 

It said Albert had formed an extra-marital relationship resulting in the birth of a daughter in the 1960s, when his brother Baudouin was king.

He has never commented on the possible existence of such a daughter but did refer in his 1999 Christmas message to a crisis in his marriage 30 years earlier, the time of Boel’s birth.  

Albert abdicated to his son Philippe in 2013 due to health reasons. 

 

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