The Vatican has appointed Polish archbishop Andrzej Józwowicz as its new ambassador to Iran.

The 56-year-old, who previously served in a lower-level diplomatic role in Iran from 2009-12, was appointed by Pope Francis yesterday. 

He takes over from Italian archbishop Leo Boccardi, who had been in the post since 2013.

Fr Józwowicz, who speaks six languages, had been the Vatican’s ambassador to Rwanda since 2017, and has also served as a diplomat in Mozambique, Thailand, Hungary, Syria and Russia.

News of Fr Józwowicz’s appointment comes just a few weeks after Iran refused to extend the visa of a 75-year-old Italian Catholic nun who had dedicated her life to helping the country’s poor and needy.

The only other nun at the convent in Isfahan, a 77-year-old Austrian, was also told she must leave the premises, leading the Vatican News Agency to warn the Catholic presence in the city would be “permanently lost”.

“It is to be hoped that the Iranian authorities will retrace their steps and reconsider their decision, allowing the sisters to continue in the country that they have loved so much and served with sacrifice and dedication,” it said.

All that now remains of the Catholic Church in Iran, the news agency said, is two Assyrian archdioceses, which between them have one bishop and four priests; an Armenian diocese, which has just one bishop; and a Roman Catholic archdiocese, which hasn’t had a priest for six years and is still awaiting the arrival of its new archbishop, Dominique Mathieu, who was consecrated in February but has not yet been issued a visa.

Yet despite the dwindling Catholic presence in Iran, Vatican spokespeople have been instrumental in the past in advocating for the release of imprisoned Christians including Mehdi Dibaj, who had been sentenced to death for apostasy and was killed shortly after his release, and Maryam Rostampour and Marziyeh Amirizadeh, who spent nearly nine months in Tehran’s Evin Prison.