The provost of Fribourg cathedral has offered a robust response to
requests from Turkey that relics of St Nicholas - housed in the
cathedral since the Middle Ages - should be returned to the saint's
Turkish birthplace.
"We will never give the relics back. They belong to the Cathedral
Chapter and to the people of Fribourg," Provost Claude Ducarroz of
Fribourg Cathedral told the Fribourg daily La Liberté when asked if he
intended to return the relics to Turkey.
The Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism has for some time been
trying to recover cultural assets from abroad for an Antiquities Museum
in Antalya.
Over the New Year, Turkey asked the Vatican to return all of
St Nicholas's relics, some of which are also in Bari, Italy.
Sailors from Bari rescued the saint's relics from Myra, which is now
in Antalya, after it was conquered by Muslim invaders in the late
eleventh century.