Turk fires shots in protest at visit of Pope Benedict

POLICE were last night questioning a man who fired shots into the air outside the Italian consulate in Istanbul to protest at the forthcoming visit by Pope Benedict XVI.

The suspect told a television reporter he wanted to “strangle” the pontiff with his bare hands.

“I don’t want him here. If he was here now I would strangle him with my bare hands,” Ibrahim Ak, aged 26, told Turkey’s Dogan news agency cameraman as he was detained by police.