Russian Church elects acting head

Kirill recently visited Cuba to consecrate a new cathedral

The Russian Orthodox Church's top body has elected a high-profile bishop, Kirill, as its temporary leader after the death of Patriarch Alexiy II.

Church leaders chose Kirill, 62, in a secret ballot a day after the death of the Church's first post-Soviet leader, Alexiy, from heart failure.

Kirill is familiar to millions of Russians from TV broadcasts and is the Church's chief envoy abroad.

Alexiy, who was 79, is to be buried on Tuesday at a cathedral in Moscow.

The Russian Orthodox Church counts nearly 70% of Russia's population - about 100 million people - among its members and, as such, is the world's biggest Orthodox Christian community.

Its power was badly eroded over more than 70 years of Soviet rule, when the atheistic state swung between persecuting believers and destroying Church property, and imposing state control on its hierarchy.

Alexiy is credited with leading its revival in the 1990s but is believed to have compromised himself with the KGB in Soviet times.

The post-Soviet Church's rigid conservatism and perceived closeness to Kremlin leaders under his guidance also alienated some.

Familiar figure

Alexiy is to be buried at Moscow's Cathedral of the Epiphany after a funeral service at the city's giant Cathedral of Christ the Saviour.

Alexiy II enjoyed close relations with the Kremlin

Kirill, whose official title is Metropolitan of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, was picked by the Church's synod at an emergency meeting in the Moscow suburb of Peredelkino.

Already tipped as a successor to Alexiy, he is familiar to Russian viewers for his long-running daily broadcast on the main TV channel ORT, The Pastor's Word.

Since the 1970s, he has travelled abroad as an envoy of the Church and, in his current role as head of its external relations department, visited Cuba in October to consecrate a cathedral in Havana.

Respected for his erudition, he is viewed by some as a reformer but has expressed deeply conservative views in public. He strongly condemned homosexuality as sinful earlier this year when he spoke out against attempts to hold a gay pride march in Moscow.

His hobbies are said to include mountain sports and water-skiing.