A strong message addressed to the rest of the world. Pope Francis denounced Tuesday, January 31 in Kinshasa the “economic colonialism” who “unleashed” in Africa and the Democratic Republic of Congo, on the first day of his visit to the country. “Take your hands off the Democratic Republic of Congo, take your hands off Africa! Stop suffocating Africa: it is not a mine to be exploited nor a land to be plundered”launched the Pope to applause, in front of the authorities and the diplomatic corps at the presidential palace.
Greeted with fervor, Pope Francis arrived in Kinshasa on Tuesday for a four-day visit to the Democratic Republic of Congo plagued by endemic violence, the first leg of a journey that will then take him to South Sudan. For his fortieth international trip since his election in 2013, the sovereign pontiff should above all call for silencing the guns in a country plagued by deadly violence.
