Israeli president and Nobel peace laureate Shimon Peres left for Rome on Monday for talks with Pope Francis and the new Italian government, his office said. "I intend to personally invite Pope Francis for an official state visit to Israel and to strengthen the good relations that already exist between Israel and the Vatican," a statement quoted Peres as saying before his departure. "The Vatican has an important role to play in the stability of the Middle East and I am sure that this visit will contribute both to the state of Israel and to the cause of peace."

The Coptic Patriarch of Alexandria Tawadros II will meet Pope Francis next month in the Vatican -- the first visit by a Coptic Orthodox leader in 40 years and the latest signs of growing ties between the new pope and the Orthodox world. Tawadros will visit various Vatican departments and is set to stay in Rome for several days. His arrival is expected for May 10 or 11, Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi told AFP. Tawadros' predecessor Shenouda III met with pope Paul VI in 1973 and the two launched a process of dialogue between their two Christian churches.

Pope Francis on Wednesday appealed for two Orthodox bishops kidnapped in Syria to be freed and for the bloodshed to end, speaking during his general audience on St Peter's Square. The pope told around 100,000 people present on the square that there were "contradictory reports" about the fate of the two bishops and asked that "they be returned quickly to their communities". jlv/dt/jz

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - Kidnappers freed two Syrian bishops on Tuesday who had been abducted in the northern city of Aleppo, a church official said, but the identities of their kidnappers remained uncertain. "The two are on their way to the patriarchy in Aleppo," Bishop Tony Yazigi told Reuters in the capital Damascus. Yazigi, a relative of one of the kidnapped bishops, did not say who was behind the kidnapping of Greek Orthodox archbishop Paul Yazigi and Syriac Orthodox archbishop Yohanna Ibrahim.