President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has appointed religious scholar and former head of the Department for Religious and Ethnic Affairs of the Ministry of Culture Andriy Yurash as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the Vatican.

Corresponding decree No. 654/2021 was published on the website of the head of state on Tuesday.

"To appoint Andriy Vasyliyovych Yurash Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Vatican," the document says.

Andriy Yurash is a Ukrainian religious scholar, political expert, an expert on state-church relations, sociology and geography of religion.

He is Associate Professor of Ivan Franko Lviv National University and the National Pedagogical Dragomanov University, Director of the Department for Religious and Ethnic Affairs of the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine (2014-2020).