00:01Precisely, our correspondent in Turkey, Yunus Honor, brings us more details on Pope Leo's 41st Apostolic Journey.
00:10Hello, good afternoon from Ankara, capital of Turkey, the city that has welcomed today Leo XIV, the new pope, on his first international trip of his pontificate.
00:23Over the coming six days, Leo XIV will visit first Turkey and then will continue to Lebanon, a country embroiled in the Middle East conflicts.
00:34Pope Leo XIV has, upon arrival in Ankara, first visited the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Turkish Republic,
00:44and then was received by the president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in the presidential palace.
00:51In the afternoon, he is expected to come together with the diplomatic staff and representatives of the civil society here in Ankara,
00:59before continuing in the evening to Istanbul to continue his program tomorrow there,
01:06and then to move on also to another Turkish city, which is the city of Iznik.
01:11The visit is important on two matters.
01:14His first mission of the pope is to get closer again to the Catholic Church with the Eastern Orthodox Church,
01:21whose symbolic leader is the patriarch of Constantinople, and he will meet him in Istanbul tomorrow and the day after as well, too.
01:32And he will also attend a ceremony commemorating the first Christian council that was held 1,700 years ago in the city of Iznik,
01:43Nikea by its old name, that shows where he will send the message of unity among the Christian world.
01:52Of course, the second mission is to advocate for peace in a shattered landscape that the Middle East now is.
02:01And here it is important to emphasize that Beirut, the city that the pope will visit, has been attacked by Israeli Air Force just days ago.
02:10But Leo XIV has insisted to keep on sticking to the plan, and he will go to Lebanon as well.
02:17So the pope will meet here in Turkey several religious leaders of different communities.
02:24Of course, he will also visit a mosque in the city of Istanbul, the famous Blue Mosque.
02:29He will come together with representatives of the Muslim belief.
02:33He will meet the Greek Orthodox community, the Armenian Catholic community.
02:38He will also hold a mass prayer in the city of Istanbul in a big arena with thousands of people are being expected there.
02:47So a highly symbolic visit that the pope Leo XIV is conducting here, which actually had been planned already under his predecessor.
02:58But as Francis has passed away in April this year, it took the pope Leo XIV to fulfill this plan of visiting Turkey and Lebanon
03:10and sending a message of gathering together between different religions and also within Christianity as well as sending a message of peace to the Middle East and to the world.
03:22We will continue his trip from here in Ankara and also tomorrow in Istanbul and further on in Iznik for Telesur.
03:29Thank you very much.
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