the lost child who has become prince out of control

Third and last child born from the marriage of Albert and Paola in Belgium, Prince Laurent was born in 1963 in a particularly disturbed family context, synonymous with institutional crisis among royal families. His uncle, King Baudoin, is indeed beginning to mourn a possible paternity and understands that he will therefore have to count on the children of his brother to succeed him on the throne.

Meanwhile, the conflict settles in the marriage of Albert and Paola, due to the bond of the prince with the baroness Sybille de Selys Longchamps. The future royal couple borders on divorce, Laurent’s father going so far as to conceive a daughter with his mistress, the future princess Delphine, born in 1968 and officially recognized by her father in 2020.

Third in the order of succession behind his father and his older brother, Philippe, Prince Laurent is very rebellious within the royal institution from childhood. Schooking in a Flemish school The young boy does not speak Dutch enough to flourish and even end up running away from the establishment before being found on a highway.

A childhood marked by chaotic education

Dyslexic and housed far from home, in Belgian foster families, the young boy lives badly his schooling, going so far as to triple his 5^th Before obtaining with difficulty the Belgian equivalent of the college certificate at 16 years old. His father then decides to get him out of the classic education system for two years of private lessons intensive at the castle, finally allowing him to win the bac at 19.

Finally graduated, the young prince will barely flourish in his higher education, joining the army and more precisely the navy, like Albert before him. He still obtained the rank of a second class vessel sign and then became a helicopter diver and pilot before being promoted to lieutenant in 1989 and frigate captain in 1994.

From substitute to current fifteenth in the order of succession

On the royal side, his destiny changed in 1991 with the repeal of the Salic law. Third, Laurent then finds herself seventh in the order of succession, his older sister, Astrid, now passing before him, as well as the three children already born from his marriage to Prince Lorenz. Two others will follow as well as four grandchildren. Now assured of never reigning on Belgium, Laurent decides to commit to the environmental cause, after failing to become a veterinarian.

One year after the accession of his father to the throne, in 1994, the Prince therefore became president of the new Royal Institute for the sustainable management of natural resources and the promotion of own technologies (IRGT), funded by Belgian regions in order to encourage consultation between political authorities, social and economic partners and environmental protection associations. However, this organization is quickly the subject of strong criticism, some believing that it is only a means for Prince Laurent to receive a salary without real work.

First member of the Belgian royal family heard by justice

Because, if the son of Albert II succeeds in making his voice heard on great fights such as the defense of animal welfare, the development of renewable energies or access to drinking water, some of his actions are not without leaving the observers very doubtful.

In 2006 in particular, an investigation into diversions carried out by several officers of the Belgian army revealed that the work of Villa Clémentine, the residence of Prince Laurent and his family, were funded by money from the Navy.

The prince will then become the first member of the royal family to be heard by justice, as a witness, before his father himself took care of reimbursing the sum of € 185,000, induced according to the investigation. Laurent’s judicial bores will stop there.

Travel embarrassing Prince Laurent

But five years later, in 2011, it was the turn of Prince Laurent’s business trips to hit the headlines. Against the advice of the Palais and the Belgian government, the king’s son decided to go to the Democratic Republic of Congo, a few months before the presidential elections, and to appear alongside Joseph Kabila, then in power for more than ten years. Acts in the former Belgian-colony which will push Albert II to get out of his reserve in order to publish a press release saying that “the king is angry”.

Little inclined to retain the lesson, the prince will then go to Libya to play the lonely ambassadors to the opponents of Muammar Gaddafi. A trip that will earn him a new reminder to order, the Belgian government going so far as to threaten to cut its endowment in the event of a new gap of conduct. A constraint to which Laurent will eventually submit … not without comparing his father and uncle to the Stasi and always allowing herself a few steps aside.

A prince Amateur of Partages and Shaps

Tastefully tasting little monarchical customs and customs and never resolving themselves to make a low profile, Prince Laurent will never stop punctuating his official life with small acts of rebellion, to the chagrin of his family.

Thus, when he married Claire Coombs at the Cathedral Saints-Michel-et-Gudule in April 2003, the brother of King Philippe decided to call on his friend, Father Guy Gilbert, nicknamed “Le Curé des Loubards” to lead the ceremony.

More serious, from 2018, the government deprives him of 15% of his annual endowment of € 450,000 for having met Chinese dignitaries without authorization, a decision to which he will respond with a letter sent to the House of Representatives, accusing them of having deprived him of “equitable trial”.

“I have never been able to decide my life”

In 2025, Prince Laurent was once again talked about by claiming the right to be able to benefit from social security, in addition to his endowment. The 61 -year -old man believes that the hundred missions he carries out each year on behalf of his brother is to be considered as salaried work and must therefore allow him to access certain social rights. A request “for the principle” that the Brussels Francophone Labor Court will declare “admissible but not founded”.

The prince will also make a reputation for bad Samaritan for his lack of civility, notably maintaining a very distant report with respect for the highway code and speed limitations, going so far as to lose his driving license in 2011. He is also accused by several employees of Brussels Airlines of having triggered sland on board by demanding to sit in Business Class with an eco class.

In 2023, answering questions from the Belgian journalist Pascale Mertens before the broadcast of a documentary concerning him on the VRT channel, Laurent de Belgique before declared “what I experienced, I describe it as experience. I would have liked to be an engineer, it was my dream. But I had no right. […] I have never been able to decide my life. It’s like that when you are part of a Western royal family. You must be used for ‘the first’. It was my duty: serve my uncle, serve my father, serve my brother ”. The curse of the eternal second who will never have forgotten to use himself …