Porphyrios

Bishop Porphyrios recognised a stolen icon of Christ on a television screen. As the Orthodox Church of Cyprus's representative in Brussels, he saw the painting on the wall of Boy George's London home in a Dutch television documentary on the singer, filmed in 2008³. He saw the gold-leaf image only briefly, then traced it to the church of St Charalambos at Neo Chorio, near Kythrea, and checked with the priest there that it had been taken. The Mail Online report of 15 February 2011 says it was taken during the 1974 invasion³.

He then contacted Boy George, who had bought the icon, about 300 years old, from an art dealer in 1985. The bishop said that the singer had not known it came from occupied Cyprus and had bought it in good faith. Boy George handed it over in London in 2011, without payment, at the church of St Anagyre near his home. The bishop gave him a modern Pantokrator painting in return, with the wish that others would soon follow his example³. Boy George said he looked forward to seeing the icon displayed in Cyprus and then returned to St Charalambos³.