German named new head of Vatican bank The Vatican has named Ernst von Freyberg, a German lawyer, as the new head of the Vatican bank, filling a position that has remained vacant since its previous president was abruptly dismissed last May. The appointment of Mr von Freyberg on Friday was confirmed by a commission of five cardinals that oversees the bank and was fully backed by Pope Benedict XVI, the Vatican said in a statement. Filling the vacancy was seen as one of the most important acts to be completed by the pontiff before he renounces the papacy at the end of the month. Mr von Freyberg's main task at the bank, formally known as the Institute for Religious Works, will be to continue to bring it into line with international banking practices and transparency. The last president of the bank, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, was removed by the bank's lay supervisory body last May, accused of "failure to carry out basic duties" and other errors, as well as "progressively erratic" personal behaviour. Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, said Mr von Freyberg had received a unanimous vote from the commission of cardinals and the bank's lay board on Thursday. "It is clear that the process wanted to be exemplary, made in a rigorous way, by competent people and with no interferences," Father Lombardi said. This is a signal of the willingness of rigour and objectivity and transparency that the Holy See is committed to. The selection process began before last summer and a headhunting company, which he did not name, was involved from September, subsequently presenting a list of 40 candidates. The last three on the shortlist were interviewed by the lay board and cardinals. Mr von Freyberg, 55, is a member of the sovereign military order of Saint John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta. He speaks four languages. "He is a well introduced person in the Church world, in which he is very active," said Father Lombardi. Doubts over the transparency of the bank's procedures were only partly removed when the IOR received last July a mixed assessment in a survey by the Council of Europe, with nine passing grades and seven negative grades given out of 16 key recommendations. The Holy See's first law to combat money laundering came into force in April 2011 and was later amended, with a new version approved in January 2012. The Council of Europe report said the city state had "come a long way in a very short period of time" but urged the Vatican to address important issues in order to enforce a fully effective regime. Among the recommendations were more rigorous criteria in selecting managers at the Vatican bank and for it to be "independently supervised by a prudential supervisor in the near future." Paolo Cipriani, IOR director-general, and Mr Gotti Tedeschi were placed under investigation by Italian prosecutors in 2010 on suspicion of breaching anti-money laundering regulations. Both have denied any wrongdoing. Italian prosecutors, investigating suspected money laundering through the Vatican, have criticised the IOR for the lack of control over who uses its accounts, raising suspicions that some clients are fronts for organised crime. IOR has denied this. The IOR has had a chequered history. It was entangled in the fraudulent collapse of Banco Ambrosiano in the 1980s, which resulted in the death of its former chairman, Roberto Calvi, who was found hanging from London's Blackfriars Bridge, and the Enimont corruption trials involving payments to Italian officials a decade later.