Global Courant
ROME — Pope Francis’s peace envoy arrived in Moscow on Tuesday hoping to help find “a solution to the tragic current situation” of the war in Ukraine, weeks after a preliminary visit to Kiev, the Vatican said.
The mission of Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, a veteran of the Catholic Church’s peace initiatives, comes as the Kremlin is reeling from the weekend’s armed uprising led by mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin. Russia has since dropped charges against Prigozhin and others who took part in the brief mutiny.
Details of Zuppi’s route were not immediately clear. When he visited Kiev earlier this month, he met President Volodymyr Zelensky. In Moscow, a visit would likely be made to the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church, whose leader Patriarch Kirill has strongly supported the war.
The Vatican has said Zuppi hopes to find “paths of peace” in his shuttle missions.
On the Moscow stage, Zuppi was accompanied by an official from the Vatican Secretariat of State. His car was seen outside the Moscow embassy on Tuesday night, according to footage broadcast on Italy’s state television RAI, which said it was expected to meet with religious and possibly political figures in the coming days.
He will remain in Moscow until Thursday, the feast of Saints Peter and Paul, an important day for both Catholic and Orthodox Christians.
“The main aim of the initiative is to encourage human gestures that can contribute to a solution to the tragic current situation and to find ways to just peace,” the Vatican statement said.
Zuppi, 67, is the archbishop of Bologna, president of Italy’s Episcopal Conference and a veteran of the Catholic Church’s peace-brokering initiatives through his long-standing association with the Sant’Egidio community. Through the Rome-based charity, Zuppi helped broker the 1990s peace deals that ended civil wars in Guatemala and Mozambique, and led the committee that negotiated a ceasefire in Burundi in 2000, according to Sant ‘Egidio.
A pastor in the style of Francis and considered “papabile” – with the qualities of a future pope – Zuppi was overheard by Francis in May.
Argentina’s Jesuit pope has repeatedly expressed solidarity with the Ukrainian people and called for peace, but has refrained from mentioning Russia or President Vladimir Putin by name.
The Vatican has a tradition of silent diplomacy and not taking sides in conflict, hoping to help forge peaceful outcomes.
(TagsToTranslate)Russia Ukraine War
