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“They didn’t let in, they didn’t say why, they said: no comment,” a cleric in Poland told BNS by phone on Monday.
He said he crossed the Polish border checkpoint on Monday, where he was on a business trip, and got stuck when he reached the Belarusian border checkpoint.
“(…) I walked, he walked, then he returned the documents and said that I was forbidden to enter Belarus,” said T. Kandrusevičius.
He is a citizen of Belarus and has a passport from that state.
According to the archbishop, the border guards advised him to apply to the Belarusian State Border Committee. Representatives of the Curia are currently clarifying the situation.
“It just came to our attention then. (…) I will be a bishop in emigration,” T. Kandrusevičius told BNS.
The statement, published on the official website of the Belarusian Catholic Church, states that “the border guards of the Republic of Belarus did not allow the head of the Belarusian Catholic diocese to enter the country through the Kuznitz-Bruges border crossing without explaining the reasons. “.
Excerpts from T. Kandrusevičius’s interview with the Polish Catholic channel TV Trwam, in which he says that the presidential elections in Belarus on August 9 were held unfairly were also posted on the church’s website.
“There are reasons to believe that the elections were conducted unfairly,” said T. Kandrusevičius. According to him, the Belarusian people “grew up enough to defend their rights, and this is not the generation of 26 years ago.”
At the same time, he stressed that the Catholic Church of Belarus calls for a peaceful solution to the social and political crisis. “The church in Belarus wants a peaceful solution,” the archbishop said.
“I called all those who were guilty to repentance, that’s how it was, and we are not alone. The Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church make similar proposals. Two days ago, the leadership of the Belarusian Orthodox Church changed. “The new metropolitan makes the first statements to the faithful and also asks for a change of opinion, repentance, because without him the problem will not be solved,” said the Belarusian Catholic leader.
Last week, he issued a public statement on OMON’s actions in Belarus after they blocked the Red Church exits in Minsk. T. Kondrusevičius described this behavior as a serious violation of the rights of believers and freedom of conscience.
He also stated that these actions by officials of the power structures do not contribute to the reduction of tensions and the restoration of reconciliation and peace in Belarusian society as soon as possible.
The president of the Belarusian Bishops’ Conference, the Archbishop of Minsk-Magilia, left Belarus last week to attend services in Białystok, Poland.
T. Kandrusevičius graduated from Kaunas Priests Seminary, worked in Vilnius, Druskininkai. He was appointed Metropolitan of Minsk-Mogilev in 2007 and in June 2015 he was elected President of the Belarusian Conference of Catholic Bishops.
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