The Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill condemned the recent ban on Serbian Patriarch Porfiria and a group of archbishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church from entering Kosovo and Metohija, writes Tanjug.

"I am saddened and outraged by the denial of the right to enter the territory of Kosovo and Metohija to Your Holiness and the seven bishops who accompanied you on the way to the Peć Patriarchate monastery, where, according to established tradition, the Serbian Orthodox Church's Assembly of Bishops was to be opened with a divine liturgy ", Kirill stated in a message addressed to Serbian Patriarch Porfirio.

The Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia points out that this step is "a gesture of hostility towards the Church of Saint Sava and a demonstrative denial of its great spiritual and historical role associated with its centuries-old presence in Kosovo*".

"Special concern in the Russian Orthodox Church is caused by the news about the increasingly difficult conditions for the survival of the Serbian population in Kosovo and Metohija, brutal pressures on our helpless brothers by the security forces of the regime in Pristina, as well as new threats that have loomed over the ancient sanctuaries of Serbian Orthodoxy." , it was stated in the message published on the website of the Russian Orthodox Church.

On May 13, the authorities of the temporary institutions of self-government in Pristina did not allow the Serbian Patriarch Porfirio and seven archbishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church to enter the Republic of Macedonia, in order to attend the official opening of the regular annual session of the Serbian Orthodox Church's Parliament in the Patriarchate of Peć.