ISTANBUL, April 5: Turkish authorities on Tuesday rejected a request from Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turk who shot and gravely wounded Pope John Paul in 1981, to leave prison to attend the pontiff’s funeral, his lawyer said.

The Pope forgave his would-be killer two years after the shooting that would mark the start of his slow decline in health.

“Our application was denied. It appears to have been a government initiative. We don’t have enough time before the funeral to appeal,” Agca’s lawyer Mustafa Demirdag said.

“Mehmet Ali will be very sad when he learns this.”

Agca, 47, is in a maximum security prison in Istanbul, having been extradited for murder and robbery after serving 19 years in Italy for the assassination attempt.

Italian authorities pardoned him at the Pope’s behest in 2000.

Agca had applied on Tuesday for a short compassionate release, which Turkish law allows for some prisoners, usually so that they can attend the funerals of family members.

“I have lost my spiritual brother. I share in the mourning of my Christian Catholic people,” Agca wrote in a rambling “open letter to the world”, in which he also repeated his claim to be the “second messiah”.

Agca’s family members may still attend the funeral on Friday, Demirdag said. The Pope had received Agca’s brother and mother at the Vatican over the years.—Reuters