Jozef Kowalczyk new Catholic primate of Poland

May 8, 2010, 13:28 GMT

Warsaw - Papal diplomat Jozef Kowalczyk has been appointed new Catholic primate of Poland, the country's Catholic Bishops Conference said on its internet site Saturday.

Pope Benedict XVI named the 71-year-old archbishop of the Archdiocese of Gniezno, a post which automatically carries with it the leadership of the Roman Catholic church in Poland.

Kowalczyk, who takes up his new office in summer, succeeds Archbishop Henryk Muszynski, who retired in March aged 77.

Kowalczyk became a priest in 1962 and went to work at the Vatican seven years later. After the establishment of diplomatic relations with Poland in 1989, he became papal nuncio in Warsaw.

Polish primates enjoyed strong powers during the postwar communist dictatorship when the Roman Catholic church suffered persecutions. But the Vatican curtailed this influence after the Cold War ended, giving the post a largely symbolic and moral character.

More than 90 per cent of Poland's 38 million population are Catholics.