Head of pope's bodyguard team resigns

VATICAN CITY, March 7 (UPI) -- The Vatican official whose main job is to keep Pope Benedict XVI safe when he visits the United States next month has resigned.

The main problem shapes up as a turf battle between the usual bodyguard and a rival Italian security force over who gets to protect the pope, The Washington Times reported Friday.

Col. Elmar Theodore Maeder decided not to seek a second five-year mandate as head of the Swiss Guards as a result of the disagreement. Maeder is still expected to accompany the pope to New York and Washington next month, however.

The problem stemmed from a proposal by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state, to deprive the Swiss Guards of their exclusive security responsibility in the Apostolic Palace, the official papal residence in Vatican City.

Bertone wants the Vatican's other security force, the Vatican Gendarmerie, to guard the Apostolic Palace as well as other parts of the Vatican, a change that would end a centuries-old tradition of pike-wielding Swiss Guards protecting the pope, the Times said.