Monaco's monarch Prince Rainier hospitalised

Monaco's Prince Rainier, one of the world's longest-serving monarchs, was admitted to hospital yesterday with a lung infection, his palace said.

Prince Rainier, 81, was not expected to stay more than a few days in hospital after his admission yesterday morning, a brief statement from the palace press office said.

Earlier this year, Prince Rainier was hospitalised with coronary problems in the tiny Mediterranean state, a low-tax haven which has been ruled by the Grimaldi family for seven centuries.

Prince Rainier, born on May 31, 1923, was married to American film icon Grace Kelly, who died in a car crash in 1982. In recent years, media attention has shifted from the monarch to the turbulent lives of his three children.

His daughter Stephanie, known as the enfant terrible of the Grimaldi family, made headlines last year with her marriage to a Portuguese circus acrobat, following her earlier liaisons with an elephant tamer and a bodyguard. When Prince Rainier succeeded his grandfather Prince Louis II in 1949, Monaco was best known for the casino on which its early prosperity was founded in the 19th century.

As Europe's last constitutional autocrat, Prince Rainier led Monaco into an age of skyscrapers, international banking and business, earning himself the nickname "The Builder".