Moscow police tear up passport of Polish monk; 2nd such incident in a week

A second Polish member of the clergy has been confronted by Russian authorities. On Monday Franciscan monk Damian Stepien was stopped by police in Moscow, who, upon making sure he was a foreigner and a Catholic, tore out a page of his passport and threw the document away. The incident follows a similar one last Friday, when Russian authorities detained Polish bishop Jerzy Mazur. According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, authorities were "seriously concerned about [Mazur's] activities". A spokesman for the Polish embassy in Moscow, Jacek Niedzielski, maintained that such a declaration in the press could not be considered a formal answer to the diplomatic note submitted by Polish authorities questioning Mazur's treatment. (Zycie, pp. 1, 7; Gazeta Wyborcza, pp. 1, 10) M.K.