MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia, whose Orthodox Church wants to block Vatican plans to strengthen its presence in the country, has barred a Roman Catholic bishop from returning to his Siberia diocese, his press service said Saturday.
Bishop Jerzy Mazur, a Pole who has been based in eastern Siberia since 1998, was declared persona non grata Friday after being stopped by Russian authorities when he flew into Moscow from Warsaw, a statement said.
The move, which followed the expulsion on April 12 of an Italian priest, Stefano Caprio, who had served for 12 years as a parish priest northeast of Moscow, dealt a fresh blow to any prospects of a visit to Russia by the ailing Pope John Paul.
The 81-year-old Polish Pontiff, who is credited with a role in undermining communism in the Soviet bloc in the 1980s, has made no secret of his wish to visit Russia and heal the thousand-year rift between the two churches before he dies.
The Vatican responded quickly to the move against Mazur by saying Russia had violated its international commitments.
"One hopes for a rapid revision of the decision taken and that Bishop Mazur may shortly return to his faithful in Siberia," the Vatican's chief spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said in a statement in Rome.
Speaking during a visit to Switzerland, Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz, the head of the Catholic Church in Moscow, said: "The events of the past months are showing that an organized campaign against Russia's Catholic Church is going on."
CHURCHES AT LOGGERHEADS
The two churches have been at loggerheads since February 11 when the Vatican moved to strengthen its structures in Russia by creating four fully-fledged catholic dioceses.
The leadership of the powerful Russian Orthodox Church immediately renewed charges that the Catholic Church was out to poach converts from its flock.
It later abruptly canceled plans for a scheduled visit by a senior Catholic cardinal to Moscow.
The statement from Mazur's diocese, based in Irkutsk, said the 48-year-old bishop was stopped at Moscow's Sheremetyevo-2 international airport Friday by border authorities who told him he was on a black list of people barred from entry.
"They canceled Bishop Jerzy Mazur's multi-entry Russian visa, which had not expired, without explanation and declared him persona non grata. Diplomatically, this in effect amounts to expulsion from the country," the statement said.
"The largest Catholic diocese in the world has been left without an arch-shepherd...the expulsion of the priests and bishops seriously destabilizes the activity of Catholic structures in Russia," it said.
The Vatican says there are 1.3 million practicing Catholics among Russia's 143 million people but some analysts put the figure much lower.
Religion has played a role in centuries of rivalry between Orthodox Russia and Catholic Poland.
Relations between the two churches were poor in the Cold War, when the Polish-born Pope spoke out against Moscow's grip on his homeland and have failed to improve significantly since the repression of religious practice was lifted.