Sep 5, 2013 / 13:49 pm
As world leaders meet in St. Petersburg, Russia, for the G20 summit, Pope Francis has sent a message urging against military involvement in Syria.
"To the leaders present, to each and every one, I make a heartfelt appeal for them to help find ways to overcome the conflicting positions and to lay aside the futile pursuit of a military solution," said Pope Francis in a Sept. 4 letter to the group's leader, Russian president Vladimir Putin.
"It is clear that, for the world's peoples, armed conflicts are always a deliberate negation of international harmony and create profound divisions and deep wounds which require many years to heal," he told the leaders of the world's twenty largest economies.
The Pope told the Russian president that although the meeting does not have international security as its main focus, it will "surely not forget the situation in the Middle East and particularly in Syria."