(Iasi, Romania, 22 October, 2000) - The Rev Luca Maria Negro, from Italy, has been appointed by the Central Committee of the Conference of European Churches to succeed Mr Robin Gurney as Secretary for Communications and Information when Mr Gurney reaches retirement age early in 2002.

Luca Negro holds dual church membership in the Waldensian and Baptist Churches in Italy, and is currently the director of the Press Agency "NEV" of the Federation of Protestant Churches in Italy (FCEI) as well as being the Executive Secretary of the FCEI.

Mr Negro (47) studied foreign languages and literature at the University of Turin, and Protestant theology at the Waldensian Theological Seminary in Rome and at the University of Tübingen, Germany, and is a gifted linguist. He has wide experience of the ecumenical movement both within Italy and outside on behalf of the FCEI, being in charge of its international ecumenical relations and working on a number of commissions. He has also been an active participant in the annual meeting of general secretaries of the European National Councils of Churches.

Luca Negro has served in a journalistic capacity at many ecumenical gatherings. He was a member of the media preparatory committee for the second European Ecumenical Assembly (Graz, Austria, 1997), and also participated as co-opted staff in the Press Room both for the EEA2 and for the 11^th Assembly of CEC. He was also co-opted to assist the media and other arrangements for the meeting between CEC and CCEE at Assisi, Italy, in 1995. For the last three years he has been the representative of the CEC on the Board of Ecumenical News International (ENI).