Pope Francis announced Bonazzi’s new appointment as apostolic nuncio to the country on the Balkan peninsula in southern Europe on Dec. 10. No replacement for Bonazzi was named.

Bonazzi, 72, was appointed to Canada in December 2013 after serving as apostolic nuncio to Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia since 2009.

Bonazzi, who was born in Gazzaniga in northern Italy in 1948 was ordained a priest in 1973 for the Diocese of Bergamo.

After earning a doctorate in education from the Salesian Pontifical University in Rome, he entered the Holy See’s diplomatic service in 1980. His stops in diplomatic missions included Cameroon, Trinidad and Tobago, Malta, Mozambique, Spain, the United States and Canada.

In 1999 he was appointed apostolic nuncio to Haiti and made an archbishop. He was then given the nuncio appointment in Cuba in 2004, serving five years.

Canada has had apostolic delegates since 1899 and nuncios 67 when they were since 1969 when the Nunciature was established by Pope Paul VI. Bonazzi was Canada’s eighth apostolic nuncio, taking over from Archbishop Pedro Lopez Quintana.