Prince Albert assumed the regency of the tiny principality of Monaco Thursday, replacing his ailing father Prince Rainer III who remains hospitalized. The announcement by the palace in Monaco puts an end to the 56-year-old reign of Rainer, Europe's longest-ruling monarch.
Rainier, 81, has been ailing for months, and his condition was not improving. He was recently placed in an intensive care unit at a Monegasque medical center for what palace officials described as a bronchial and lung infection.
Ranier, the head of Europe's ancient Grimaldi royal family, was also considered one of Monaco's most powerful and effective rulers. His reign transformed his square-mile territory, tucked inside the French Riviera, into one of the world's most glamorous and moneyed capitals, where real estate prices rank among the highest in the world.
Albert, the new regent, has long enjoyed a somewhat carefree lifestyle and brings a very different approach to ruling. At 47, he remains one of the most eligible bachelors in Europe. He participated on Monaco's Olympic team in 2002 as a bobsledder, and has also competed in the 1985 Paris-Dakar car rally.
Despite a much-publicized economic standoff against France in 1962 -- when Rainier eventually ceded to the demands of French President Charles de Gaulle -- the monarch slowly chipped away at France's most-obvious holds on the principality.
A pair of agreements recently cinched with Paris granted Monaco greater independence, including the possibility of appointing native Monegasques, rather than French officials, to head the government for the first time.
"He's the prince who managed to restore sovereignty to this principality," said Rainier biographer Frederic Laurent. "When he mounted the throne, Monaco was a French protectorate. By his death, he restored sovereignty to the principality."
Under Rainier's sometimes-iron hand, Monaco blossomed into a tax-free paradise for some of world's richest and most famous people. The principality -- a concrete jungle soaring amid scattered palm trees and bougainvillea and abutting the Mediterranean Sea -- boasts a world-famous ballet, casino and a grand prix.
Monaco's coveted real estate is rented and sold at staggering prices, and the Grimaldi family is regularly featured in popular magazines -- albeit not always for the right reasons.
Life was not always so sweet in Monaco when the prince was born, on May 31, 1923. He was the only son of Princess Charlotte Louise Juliette, the illegitimate, Algerian-born daughter of Louis II of Monaco. She was later legitimated.
Rainier studied in British academies and went to university in France. He was awarded for his valor in fighting the Nazis during World War II, earning the rank of chevalier (knight) in the French Legion of Honor.
When Louis II died in 1949, Rainier inherited an impoverished principality and a dilapidated royal palace.
"Prince Rainier brought considerable economic development to Monaco," Laurent said. "The principality managed to recover land from the sea. And it's become a small financial power. It's the first economic region in the Cote d'Azur."
Rainier is perhaps best known for his marriage to American movie actress Grace Kelly, in 1956. The couple had three children, Caroline, Albert and Stephanie. Princess Grace died in a car accident in 1982.
More recently, Monaco's glamour was dulled by scandal. The principality briefly ranked on a "gray list" of money-laundering states compiled by the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force. And in 2000, French lawmakers criticized the French-dominated Monegasque government for tolerating financial improprieties -- a charge the principality and its prince angrily denied.
Monaco has now cleaned up its reputation and diversified its income away from gambling and real estate. Although not a member of the European Union, it belongs to the Council of Europe and the United Nations. Few doubt its capacity to survive in the 21st century even as it is increasingly pressed to comply with EU fiscal policies.
"People actually like to think there are these tiny places that still exist and are run in the same way they were run 700 or 1,000 years ago," said Marco Incerti, a research fellow at the Center for European Policy in Brussels. "It contributes to the European myth."
Indeed, as the power of monarchs from larger European states such as Britain erodes, that of those ruling tiny principalities such as Monaco and Liechtenstein has increased -- though, in the case of Monaco, a constitution was passed and the parliament given greater say during Rainier's rule.
Analysts say, however, the 47-year-old Albert, Rainier's heir, will have a different touch.
"I think it will be different with Prince Albert," Laurent said. "I think he'll delegate more power. I think he'll be more of a prince of consensus. And I think that Monaco, under Prince Albert, will be more democratic."
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(Claude Salhani reported from Washington, Elizabeth Bryant from Paris)
