An influential Vatican journalist has written that a member of the
8-member committee appointed by Pope Francis in July to help reforms in
the Vatican’s economic activities may have been involved in the
“Vatileaks” scandal.
Sandro Magister of L’Espresso reports that Francesco Chaouqui, an Italian laywoman with a background in public relations, was the source of a report in La Repubblica,
publishing in March, claiming that Paolo Gabriele was not the only
source of Vatican documents leaked to the Italian media.
Magister says
that Chaouqui may have ties to Gianluigi Nuzzi, the Italian journalist
who published the stolen documents.
Chaouqui has come under scrutiny because of a series of controversial
comments that she had posted on her Twitter account before her
appointment to the Vatican reform panel. She has since closed down the
Twitter account.
Magister, for his part, has become an active participant in the debate
over Vatican reforms.
He published explicit charges that Msgr. Battista
Ricca, the Pope’s choice as prelate of the Vatican bank, had a past
involvement in homosexual scandal.
Magister now insists that Msgr.
Ricca’s continued presence at the Vatican bank—which Pope Francis has
supported—is a “glaring contradiction” to the Pope’s plans for reform.