Felipe demands model behavior amid father's scandal

Spanish King Felipe VI used his traditional Christmas Eve speech to make a renewed call for Spain's leaders to demonstrate exemplary behavior, a message he delivered Thursday night amid a financial scandal centering on his father, the country’s previous monarch.

Felipe said in a televised address that citizens demand “principles that apply to everyone, without exception, and that are above any other considerations, including personal or family (bonds).”

The message was widely interpreted as a rebuke to the alleged financial improprieties threatening to tarnish the once immaculate reputation of King Emeritus Juan Carlos I.

Juan Carlos stunned Spain in August when he moved to the United Arab Emirates after it emerged that prosecutors in Spain and Switzerland were investigating him for possible financial wrongdoing.

Felipe, who became king after his father's 2014 abdication, has tried to distance himself from Juan Carlos.