Pope Francis arrives in Iraq for historic papal visit, amid coronavirus and security fears

Pope Francis landed in war-battered Iraq on Friday on a first-ever papal visit, defying security fears and the pandemic to comfort one of the world’s oldest and most persecuted Christian communities.The 84-year-old, who said he was travelling to Iraq as a “pilgrim of peace”, will also reach out to Shiite Muslims when he meets Iraq’s top cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.His plane landed at 1.55pm, waving the flags of both Vatican City and Iraq as it taxied on the tarmac at Baghdad…

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