Metropolitan Kirill meets with Slovenian Ambassador Andrey Benedeicic

Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for Church External Relations, met on April 27, 2006, with the Slovenian Ambassador to Moscow, Andrey Benedeicic.

In the beginning of their talk, the ambassador pointed to the importance and relevance of the human rights and dignity issue raised by the 10th World Russian People’s Council. He pointed to the positive response that the work of the Council provoked in the political circles in Slovenia. He also spoke of the development of friendly contacts between the two nations. Recently, the chapel on the Vrsic pass, where Russian soldiers fell in action during World War I, has been restored, and a monument to Russian Cossacks has been erected. It is also planned to lay out a commemoration square near the chapel and to give the road leading to the pass the name of Russian. The main part of their talk was devoted to the program of the celebrations to mark the 90th anniversary of the battle of Vrsic.