Pope Francis asked the world on Wednesday to “avoid the risk of a nuclear disaster” in Ukraine and reiterated that the “war is crazy” six months after the start of the Russian invasion of that country.
“I renew my invitation to implore the peace of the Lord for the beloved Ukrainian people, who for six months have suffered the horror of war,” Francis said during the traditional Wednesday general audience at the Vatican.
In his message he urged “that concrete measures be taken to end the war and avoid the risk of a nuclear disaster in Zaporizhia,” he cried.
“I think of so much cruelty, of so many innocent people who are paying for the madness, the madness of all sides, because war is madness,” he said.
Several countries have expressed their fears about the possibility of a disaster in the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, occupied since the beginning of March by the Russian army and the target of recurrent bombing.
“I think of the poor girl who had a bomb explode under the seat of a car in Moscow. The innocent pay for the war, the innocent!” lamented the pope, referring to the death of Daria Douguina, a journalist and political scientist from 29 years old, daughter of the considered ideologue of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Aleksandr Dugin.
The pope also drew attention to the dramas left by the war and once again condemned those who deal in arms.
“I think of the children. So many dead and so many refugees. So many wounded. So many Ukrainian and Russian children have been orphaned. Orphans have no nationality: they have lost a father or a mother,” he said.
“Those who profit from war (…) are criminals who murder humanity,” stressed the pope, who on several occasions has condemned the so-called “third world war in pieces” when referring to the numerous conflicts and in particular to Syria and Yemen.
