Strange Methods in the Vatican.

The Vatican's auditor general, Libero Milone, who stood down in June, has revealed to the Corriere della Sera that his resignation was forced.

From Milone's explanations emerges that Archbishop Giovanni Becciu, the substitute in the Vatican's Secretary of State, was behind his ousting. Becciu has acted as Francis' axman before. He stabbed the Dominican theologian, Father Giovanni Cavalcoli, in the back when Cavalcoli was unjustly attacked by the media. Becciu was also Francis' battle horse against Cardinal Burke and the Order of Malta.

Becciu used a Vatican police investigation in order to pressure Milone into leaving his post. The commander of police, Giandomenico Giani screamed at Milone in his office urging him to confess. Milone's frightened collaborators were blocked in the building until 8.30 at night. Vatican firefighters were called in to break into a cupboard and a writing desk of a collaborator who was not present.

The police confronted Milone with two bills over 28'000 Euros allegedly showing that the same service was paid twice to the same company. But Milone could show that one of the bills was not from his office but forged. Milone was further accused of having inappropriately collected information about Vatican representatives, which in reality was part of his work as he was in charge of money laundering and corruption combat.

The commander of Vatican police intimidated Milone, threatened him with arrest, pushed him into offering his resignation and confronted him with a prepared resignation letter.

In July, one month after his ousting, Milone wrote to Francis whom he knows personally. The letter was transmitted through what Milone calls, "a secure channel". To Milone's disappointment, Francis never replied. Milone believes that the old Vatican power structure felt threatened by his findings and therefore eliminated him.

The Vatican press office quickly reacted with a statement against Milone accusing him of having investigated about the private life of Vatican representatives calling this "illegal" and "a crime". The statement does not offer any explanation why Milone, if he indeed broke Vatican law, was never prosecuted.