Bishop • who is believed to have been murdered by Tito's Communists have filed a petition asking the courts to declare him to be dead.
If it is granted, the court will have to make an official investigation into the mysterious "disappearance" in 1945 of the Bishop, Mgr. Josip Carevic, who had retired as Ordinary of Dubrovnik five years earlier.
About 15 months after he disappeared, a skeleton was found in a well at Dubrovnik, a seaside resort on the Adriatic coast. The authorities ordered it to be buried without religious ceremonies.
In 1953 a cross was found in the same well. A priest identified it as having belonged to the Bishop. Despite complaints by Mgr. Carevic's relatives, the authorities have taken no action, and the police have warned possible witnesses, including priests, to keep quiet about the matter—otherwise there would be "trouble".
The skeleton's grave has become a place of pilgrimage, and several times notices have been erected marking it as that of the Bishop Each time they have been removed during the night.
Fr. Francis Xavier Wang, a Chinese Jesuit, has died in a Shanghai hospital from his sufferings in a Communist prison. He was arrested in 1953, and released recently.