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Albert II, the former king of Belgium, will be fined €5,000 per day until he accepts to undergo a DNA test, the Brussels appeals court ruled on Thursday, Euronews reports.

In February, the former monarch refused to undergo a DNA test requested to prove his paternity in the case of a love child he is said to have fathered in the 1960s, a claim Albert II, 84, denies.

At the time, the Brussels court had given the ex-king three months to provide a sample of his DNA in the form of saliva. He appealed.

If the former king does not comply, he will now be fined €5,000 for each day he continues to refuse to do undergo the test – and risks being presumed to be the father of Delphine Boël, 50, the woman who started the legal procedure to get official recognition as the former king's child.

The fines will start the day after his soon-to-be-announced appointment for the DNA test.

On 25 October 2018, the Brussels appeals court concluded that Jacques Boël was not Delphine Boël's legal father, and asked experts to establish whether Boël's real father was Albert II.

This Belgian drama started in 1999 when an unauthorised biography of the king's wife published allegations that the king had fathered an illegitimate child.

The Baroness Sybille de Selys Longchamps, Boël's mother, has claimed she had an affair with him between 1966 and 1984, before he became king.

In 2005, Delphine Boël said in an interview that Albert II was her biological father.

The reign of King Albert II of Belgium lasted two decades, from 1993, when he came to the throne after his brother's death, until 2013, when the king abdicated citing health reasons, in favour of his son Philippe.

Delphine Boël started filing her legal case shortly after the king's abdication, which re-started the scandal and created rumours that Albert II had given up the throne because of it.