The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, whose backing for Moscow's "special military operation" in Ukraine has dismayed many fellow Christians, said on Saturday he hoped it would end quickly but again did not condemn it.
At an outdoor service at Moscow's Christ the Saviour Cathedral on the eve of Orthodox Easter, Patriarch Kirill splashed holy water onto loaves of colourfully decorated Easter bread known as kulichi and said many of them would be sent to the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.
