site.btaPresident Plevneliev Ends Official Visit to Vatican

President Plevneliev Ends Official Visit to Vatican

Vatican/Rome, May 17 (BTA Exclusive by Hristo Petrov) - President Rosen Plevneliev attended a public prayer service at the San Paolo alla Regola church Tuesday morning. The Roman Catholic diocese placed the church at the disposal of the Bulgarian Orthodox community for worship.

This ended Plevneliev's official two-day visit to the State of Vatican. This year the visit of the President and the accompanying official Bulgarian delegation to the Vatican on the occasion of the Day of Bulgarian Education and Culture and Slav Letters, May 24, was dedicated to the 1100th anniversary of the death of St. Clement of Ochrida, as well as to the 1150th anniversary of talks between Prince Boris I and Pope Nicholas which launched diplomatic relations between Bulgaria and the Vatican.

On Monday, Plevneliev paid homage and laid flowers at the grave of St. Cyril in the San Clement Church. Before that, he was received by Pope Francis and conferred with the Secretary of State Pietro Parolin. Plevneliev also laid a wreath at the grave of St. Peter, the monuments to Pope John XXIII (who was the nuncio to Bulgaria from 1925 to 1934), as well as to Pope John Paul II and Ivan Vazov, who is known as the Patriarch of Bulgarian Contemporary Literature.