Parolin calls for increased peace effort

The Vatican has written to all the embassies accredited to the Holy See to urge the governments they represent to strive harder to resolve the crisis of conflict in the Middle East, write Hannah Roberts and Tom Heneghan.

With the high death toll in Gaza and violence escalating in Iraq, Syria and Libya, Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin sent each embassy a note verbale, normally used to advise about a particular issue or to obtain the support of a particular government, which included excerpts from Pope Francis’ recent homilies calling for peace, particularly in the Middle East.

Mgr Dominique Mamberti, Secretary for Relations with States, explained that the Pope wanted the international community “to take the question of peace to heart”. He referred specifically to Syria and Iraq, where Islamic State extremists in recent weeks have forced thousands of Christians to leave their homes.

Meanwhile, the president of the Italian bishops’ conference, Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, criticised the European Union for being “blind and mute in the face of persecution of hundreds of thousands of Christians” in the Middle East.

This week the French Foreign Minister, Laurent Fabius, said Paris would ask the United Nations Security Council to condemn the Islamic State for the expulsions and ask the UN Human Rights Council “to investigate these crimes”.

He stressed his Government’s determination to help the religious minorities, and said he would visit Iraq soon to discuss the problem with Baghdad.

Mr Fabius was speaking after meeting Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Bishop of Evry Michel Dubost – the head of the French bishops’ interfaith dialogue council – and Mgr Pascal Gollnisch, the head of the L’Oeuvre d’Orient charity supporting Middle East Christians, on their return from meeting persecuted Christians in northern Iraq (The Tablet, 2 August).

“The Iraqi Christians had to know we are praying for them,” said Barbarin. “They demand justice, but without any hate or call for vengeance.”