{"id":44751,"date":"2021-02-28T21:22:55","date_gmt":"2021-02-28T21:22:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=44751"},"modified":"2021-02-28T21:22:55","modified_gmt":"2021-02-28T21:22:55","slug":"un-calls-for-children-in-syria-camps-to-be-allowed-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=44751","title":{"rendered":"UN calls for children in Syria camps to be allowed home"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nROME: The pope\u2019s upcoming visit to Iraq is a \u201cprecious gift\u201d not only for the Christians who live there, but for all those who after years of war want a return to peace and coexistence between religions, a priest who worked for eight years in the diocese of Mosul told Arab News.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe\u2019ve been waiting for this for a long time. Pope Francis is coming \u2026 to invite us to all be instruments of peace,\u201d said Jalal Jako.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cLike a dove, he\u2019ll bring a twig of peace to all the people living in this land who\u2019ve suffered for too long.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nJako, currently in Italy, will return to Iraq for the pope\u2019s visit, which will begin on March 5.<\/p>\n

\nThe priest was born in Qaraqosh, a historic Christian city near Mosul, which is part of the pope\u2019s itinerary.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nJalal Jako visiting a church in Qaraqosh after it was badly damaged by Daesh. (Supplied)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\nHe fled the region in August 2014 along with nearly 150,000 Christians and made his way to Erbil in northern Iraq. There, Jako worked in a refugee camp where he said the conditions for those who had fled the extremists were \u201cterrible.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nWhen he returned to Qaraqosh three years later, \u201cWe found that everything had been destroyed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\nThe pope will be welcomed by Iraq\u2019s prime minister in Baghdad and then visit the country\u2019s president at the presidential palace, where he will meet with local authorities, representatives of civil society and the diplomatic corps.<\/p>\n

\nPope Francis will also meet with bishops and priests at the Syriac Catholic Church of Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad.<\/p>\n

\nOn March 6, he will fly to the city of Najaf and meet with Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani. The pope will return to Baghdad that day and celebrate Holy Mass at the Chaldean Cathedral of St. Joseph.<\/p>\n

\nOn March 7 he will visit Erbil, capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, and meet with religious and civil authorities of the autonomous region. He will also visit the city of Qaraqosh. His return to Rome is scheduled for March 8 from Baghdad.<\/p>\n

\nJako said: \u201cWe can\u2019t fail to be there at such an important moment for us Christians \u2014 the first visit of a pope to Iraq. He\u2019ll tell us, \u2018No more blood, live all as brothers.\u2019 Thus he\u2019ll send out a message that all the Iraqi people need.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nJako added: \u201cPope John Paul II was supposed to come on a pilgrimage in 2000 \u2026 but it wasn\u2019t possible for him. Pope Francis is keeping his predecessor\u2019s promise to come to Iraq to visit a Christian community that today has only 500,000 faithful, a third of the number who lived there in 2003. He comes as the leader of a Church that respects all religions and aims to build peace.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ROME: The pope\u2019s upcoming visit to Iraq is a \u201cprecious gift\u201d not only for the Christians who live there, but for all those who after years of war want a return to peace and coexistence between religions, a priest who worked for eight years in the diocese of Mosul told Arab News. \u201cWe\u2019ve been waiting…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spotlight_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44751\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}