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| Nazi row bishop leaves Argentina | Nazi row bishop leaves Argentina |
| (10 minutes later) | |
| A British Roman Catholic bishop embroiled in a row over Holocaust denial has flown out of Argentina days after being told to leave the country. | A British Roman Catholic bishop embroiled in a row over Holocaust denial has flown out of Argentina days after being told to leave the country. |
| Richard Williamson was asked to leave Argentina, where he had been living, after he refused to retract his denial of the existence of Nazi gas chambers. | Richard Williamson was asked to leave Argentina, where he had been living, after he refused to retract his denial of the existence of Nazi gas chambers. |
| The row hugely embarrassed the Vatican which had only recently lifted an excommunication order on the bishop. | The row hugely embarrassed the Vatican which had only recently lifted an excommunication order on the bishop. |
| He took a British Airways plane bound for London from Buenos Aires. | He took a British Airways plane bound for London from Buenos Aires. |
| Wearing dark glasses and a cap, Bishop Williamson was swiftly moved through the Argentine capital's Ezeiza international airport, accompanied by two men. | |
| After completing customs formalities, he boarded a British Airways flight for London, airport officials said. | |
| Last Thursday he was given 10 days to leave by the government for having "deeply shocked Argentine society, the Jewish people and all of humanity". | |
| Earlier, he had been removed from his post as head of a Roman Catholic seminary near Buenos Aires. | |
| 'No gas chambers' | |
| The row erupted in January after Pope Benedict decided to lift Bishop Williamson's excommunication on an unrelated matter. | |
| The bishop passed through Buenos Aires airport in dark glasses | |
| After that move, it emerged that the bishop had denied the full extent of the Nazi genocide of the Jews in an interview for Swedish TV. | |
| "I believe there were no gas chambers," he had said. | |
| "I think that two to three hundred thousand Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps but none of them by gas chambers." | |
| The Vatican later said the Pope had been unaware of Bishop Williamson's views and had ordered him to recant. | |
| Pope Benedict met American Jewish leaders at the Vatican in a display of solidarity with victims of the Nazis. | |
| The decision to lift the excommunication order was related to the appointment of Richard Williamson as bishop by a breakaway archbishop more than 20 years ago. | |
| Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, who died in 1991, had rebelled against liberal reforms in the Church, such as the ending of the Latin Mass. |