In 2012, former Spanish king Juan Carlos hunted elephants in Africa with his ex-lover Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, and he was heavily criticized afterwards.

Botswana South African country hunting trip is a gift from the king to his son zu Sayn-Wittgenstein on his 10th birthday.

On April 11, 2012, Mr. Juan Carlos shot and killed a 50-year-old elephant, weighing 5 tons.

On the morning of April 13, 2012, the king fell in a hunting tent and broke his hip.

"I'm sorry," said King Juan Carlos after leaving the hospital.

"The scandals surrounding the Botswana trip expose many things," said Jose Antonio Zarzalejos, former editor of the ABC right-wing Spanish newspaper. "First, the king was not faithful to Queen Sofia.

King Juan Carlos and zu Sayn Wittgenstein knew each other at a hunting expedition in February 2004.

"We then chatted on the phone for a few months," said zu Sayn Wittgenstein.

Zu Sayn Wittgenstein, then a single mother with two children living in London, just started a counseling service.

Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein said that King Juan Carlos proposed to her in 2009. He then met his father zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, insisting that their relationship was very serious.

"It was a very emotional moment," she said.

However, when her father died a few months later of cancer, the king said goodbye to zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, which shocked her.

Even though the relationship ended, the two remained friends, partly because the king was close to zu Sayn-Wittgenstein's children.

That friendship led to the elephant hunt in 2012. King Juan Carlos was stripped of the honorary chairmanship of the Spanish branch of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature after the trip.

"Since returning from that trip, I have been closely monitored," said zu Sayn-Wittgenstein.

After much criticism from public opinion, in 2014, King Juan Carlos abdicated, passing the throne to his son Felipe.

Prosecutors have taken note of Juan Carlos' relations in the Middle East.

In a recording released by the Spanish media in 2018, a Spanish-speaking female voice asked, "Why does he have so much money? He boarded a plane to Arab countries and returned with

Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein did not identify the woman in the recording as her.

The focus of attention was a payment of $ 100 million from the late King of Saudi Arabia, transferred to a Swiss bank account linked to a foreign organization based in Panama in 2008. The beneficiary was former King Juan

The Swiss prosecutor investigates three people who have connections with the former king.

In Spain, the Supreme Court opened an investigation with Juan Carlos, but they could only see if he miscarried after his abdication in 2014.

Earlier this month, the 82-year-old former king surprised many by announcing he had left Spain.

Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein was one of the individuals investigated by the Swiss prosecutor, because in 2012, after the elephant hunting scandal, Juan Carlos transferred 65 of the 100 million euros he received from Saudi Arabia to her.

"I think he was shocked to understand the pressure and scandal I have endured," said zu Sayn-Wittgenstein.

In testimony before the Swiss prosecutor, zu Sayn-Wittgenstein said she believed the former king gave her money out of love.

"In 2014, he tried very hard to reconnect his old love with me," she said.

In Spain, the gift of tens of millions of EUR Mr. Juan Carlos made the public outraged.

Ivette Torrent, a young lawyer from Barcelona, has initiated an online petition calling for that money to be transferred to the Spanish public health system.

Despite being in legal trouble, zu Sayn-Wittgenstein says she "has no regrets about her affair with Juan Carlos".