As part of his efforts to mitigate the refugee crisis in Europe, Pope Francis arrived on Cyprus on Thursday with a focus on inter-faith dialogue.
With Cyprus being at the forefront of Europe’s migration crisis, the island’s people are struggling to deal with the influx of undocumented migrants from the Middle East.
“It will be a beautiful trip but we will touch some wounds. I hope that we all will be able to gather up the messages given to us,” Pope Francis told journalists while still on the aircraft to Aphrodite’s island.
Moreover, he sent a telegram to President Katerina Sakellaropoulou as he was flying above Greece airspace on his way to Cyprus, announcing that he would take 50 refugees from Cyprus to Italy.
Children and citizens waving flags of Cyprus and the Vatican welcomed Francis at Larnaca airport offering him flowers.
President Anastasiades said the Cypriot people “know better than anyone the pain of uprooting and refuge from their ancestral homes,” and thanked the pope highlighting that “Cyprus is the recipient of the most refugees as a proportion of its population, with many flowing through the Turkish-occupied territories in the north”
Urging Cypriots to open their land and hearts to more refugees, he drew on the island’s painful history:
“The greatest wound suffered by this land has been the terrible laceration it has endured in recent decades. I think of the deep suffering of all those people unable to return to their homes and their places of worship,” Pope Francis said raising the important of diplomatic dialogue.
“We know that it is no easy road; it is long and winding, but there is no other way to achieve reconciliation.”
The Pope will travel to Athens on Saturday while he plans to visit refugee reception center on Lesvos, which has been the most afflicted area in Greece since the beginning of the migrant crisis in 2015.