Russia outraged by Pope’s comments

The Pope’s latest statements on the Ukrainian war were met with anger in Russia and Chechnya. Russia’s Ambassador to the Vatican, Alexander Avdeev, told Russia’s state news agency Ria Novosti that he expressed his anger at the Holy See.

The incident was an interview with Pope Francis published earlier in the week by the Jesuits’ “America Magazine”. In it, Francis denounced the “oppression” of Russian troops in Ukraine.

It is reported that Ambassador Avdeev, in addition to his anger at these allegations, emphasized that “nothing can shake the unity and unity of the Russian multinational people”.

“We will not start a war without first offering peace,” Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said via Telegram, according to the Interfax agency. There is not a single alcoholic or drug addict among the Chechen troops.

“Every soldier is extremely religious, and every soldier knows that even during a war one should not forget honor, dignity and respect for the enemy,” said Kadyrov. The Pope, it seems, was “only the victim of foreign media propaganda and insistence”. Kadyrov and Chechen special forces are accused internationally of committing the most serious human rights crimes in the Ukraine war.

According to Interfax, the spiritual leader of the Russian Buddhists, Pandito Hambo-Lama Damba Badmajewitsch Ajuschejew, described Pope Francis’ claims as unfair. European Catholics fail to understand that living in cold Siberia and the Far East makes people “more resilient and more patient” in the face of adversity. “Therefore, our people are not cruel”; but they would have to defend themselves and “save their homeland from fascism, as our grandparents did.”