The Council of Europe will organise yearly meetings on the religious dimension of intercultural dialogue. This is the first result of the conference which is going on in San Marino about this topic, which, opened yesterday by Minister Fiorenzo Stolfi, will continue today. "Proposing these yearly meetings explains Christian Ter Stephanien, president of the special reflection team established by the CoE is a mediation between two opposing positions, one in favour of a form of structured dialogue, the other strongly reticent about the idea of opening such dialogue". The subject of the second session of the meeting is: "Dialogue between the Council of Europe, the religious communities and society: reflections and proposals". In his welcome address, the Orthodox Patriarch of Moscow and Russia, Alexius, states, quoting King Solomon: "A neighbour who is close is better than a brother who is distant". Alexius expressed the wish that the conference "may contribute to freeing the international community of the contradictions that derive from religious differences". "Dialogue between religions he added is the prerequisite to develop relations between all Europeans based on morality and mutual support".
