Lebanese court ponders fate of Bishop’s robes

LEBANESE security forces are holding a suitcase containing an Anglican Bishop’s vestments after Cyprus Airways (CY) sent the clergyman to Tel Aviv and his luggage to Beirut.
For the past six weeks, the CY office in Beirut has been trying to extricate the bag from the clutches of the Lebanese military, which is considering whether to release the luggage. However, the judge dealing with the case recently suffered a heart attack, causing a further setback, sources at the CY office in Beirut told the Cyprus Mail yesterday.
The saga began when Bishop Bob Jones, head of the Anglican Church for Cyprus and the Middle East, travelled with CY to Tel Aviv to carry out Easter services in Jerusalem in April. While Bishop Jones made it to Tel Aviv, his bag was mistakenly sent to Beirut.
Since then, CY has been trying to have the luggage released, the source at the airline’s office in Beirut said. “I tried to resolve the issue with customs in Beirut after they saw what was in the bag, but it didn’t work,” the source said.
He said the issue lay in the fact that the bag was sent to Beirut with a Tel Aviv tag. Israel and Lebanon do not have any diplomatic relations. “This is all because the label said ‘Tel Aviv’,” he added. “It’s a security measure. It’s not anything against the Bishop. It’s just bureaucracy.”
The source said CY was doing its best and had been making progress when the judge in charge of the case, who was ready to make a decision, had a heart attack. “We are hoping that by Monday we may have some news,” the source said.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.