Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Kirill canceled the planned participation in the September interfaith conference, which will be held in Kazakhstan, in Nur-Sultan. During the conference, as expected, he was to meet with Pope Francis, Voice of America reports with reference to the RIA Novosti agency..

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The head of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Anthony of Volokolamsk, told the agency that Patriarch Kirill will not take part in the conference, which will be held from September 13 to 15, and therefore the meeting with Pope Francis will not take place..

Earlier in July, Francis confirmed that he would meet Kirill at a conference in Kazakhstan, which would be the second meeting between the pope and the patriarch..

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Their first meeting took place in 2016, the second was planned for June, but was canceled due to the diplomatic consequences of the war..

Kirill justified the invasion of Ukraine. He claimed that it had spiritual and ideological foundations and called it a "

The clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Churches collected 427 signatures under an appeal to the Primates of the Eastern Churches on the trial of Patriarch Kirill, who supported the war of the Russian Federation against Ukraine.