The pontiff said that he wanted to go to Moscow first, but he was refused admittance.
Pope Francis does not rule out plans to visit Ukraine after his visit to Canada, which is scheduled for the end of July. He stated this in an interview with Reuters.
The head of the Catholic Church said that he planned to visit Moscow first, although no pope had done this before, as he wanted to somehow influence the Russian the leadership that is waging war in Ukraine. However, the question of a trip to Russia seemed unrealistic from the very beginning.
“I would like to go (to Ukraine), and I wanted to go to Moscow first. We exchanged messages about this because I thought that if the Russian president would give me a small window to serve the cause of peace…” Francis said.
“And now maybe, after I come back from Canada, maybe I will be able to go to Ukraine,” he added.
The Pope's official visit to Canada is scheduled for July 24-30, but it may be postponed due to the pontiff's knee injury. In particular, it was because of this that his official visit to the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan was canceled in early July.
Due to the cancellation of the trip, rumors about the possible resignation of Pope Francis, who recently visited the city of L'Aquila, intensified in the media space. associated with Pope Celestine V, who resigned from the papacy in 1294, and Pope Benedict XVI, who visited the city four years before his resignation in 2013. However, Francis categorically denied this information.
“All these coincidences made some people think that the same procedure will take place. But it didn't occur to me. At the moment, definitely not,” he answered.
Read also: Kuleba once again invited the Pope to Ukraine
Although Pope Francis publicly condemned Russian aggression in Ukraine, a number of his steps provoked a negative attitude towards the head of the Catholic Church among Ukrainians. In particular, in an interview with La Civiltà Cattolica, he stated that the head of the Kremlin was somehow provoked to invade Ukraine.
