Pope's former butler to give evidence

Pope Benedict XVI has returned to the Vatican after three months on holiday to find his former butler on trial in one of the most damaging scandals of his pontificate: the leaks of stolen papal correspondence detailing power struggles, defamation campaigns and allegations of corruption at the highest level of the Catholic Church.

Paolo Gabriele is to be questioned today by the president of the Vatican tribunal, the first time the public will hear from the butler himself about the events that landed him in a Vatican detention facility on May 23, accused of stealing the documents and giving them to a journalist.