Vatican: No invitation yet for Pope Benedict XVI to Belarus
Alexander Lukashenka spoke twice in the recent months that he wanted to see the Pope in Belarus. But neither Belarus’s foreign ministry nor president’s press office nor Vatican know anything about the official invitation for the Pope.
Lukashenka made the first sensational public statement about inviting the Pope in June when Vatican’s State Secretary Tarciose Bertone was on a visit in Minsk. The high-ranking Vatican official then told journalists “the President of Belarus has officially invited Pope Benedict XVI to pay a visit to Belarus”.
But Pavel Lyogki, the press secretary of the Belarusian president, says a vocal invitation is not enough.
“There should be an official document, naturally. Invitations are not passed vocally”.
The European Radio for Belarus has called Belarus’s foreign ministry to find out if the official invitation was indeed sent to Vatican. The press office could not confirm it but said:
“When the president says that “we are inviting”, this should not be put under doubt”.
Pavel Lyogki does not have information about any official invitation.
“The head of the president’s press office may not know it, because the flow of the paperwork arrives through different channels… But when a certain proposal is passed and a reply is received and a meeting is organized, I will have information that the meeting will take place”.
The official says that if such an invitation was sent, the foreign ministry would have known about it… The press office of Belarus’s foreign ministry told ERB to seek information about a possible visit of the Pope in Vatican.
The Holy See’s office in Minsk told the European Radio for Belarus that no information on the official invitation was available.
The Vatican’s press office did not see any official invitation, either.
“We do not have anything on the schedule”, one of the staff told the European Radio for Belarus.
One can hardly believe that an official list could be misplaced.
