On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis launches holy Jubilee year

Pope Francis holds a figurine of baby Jesus during the Christmas Eve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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Pope Francis holds a figurine of baby Jesus during the Christmas Eve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Pope Francis celebrates Christmas Eve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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Pope Francis celebrates Christmas Eve Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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Updated 24 December 2024
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On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis launches holy Jubilee year

On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis launches holy Jubilee year
  • Pope had drawn an angry response from Israel at the weekend for condemning the “cruelty” of Israel’s strikes in Gaza that killed children

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis opened the “Holy Door” of St. Peter’s Basilica on Christmas Eve on Tuesday, launching the Jubilee year of Catholic celebrations set to draw more than 30 million pilgrims to Rome.
The 88-year-old pontiff, who has recently been suffering from a cold, was pushed in a wheelchair up to the huge, ornate bronze door and knocked on it, before the doors opened.
In a ceremony watched on screens by thousands of faithful outside in St. Peter’s Square, the Argentine pontiff went through the door followed by a procession, as the bells of the Vatican basilica rang out.
Over the next 12 months, Catholic pilgrims will pass through the door — which is normally bricked up — by tradition benefiting from a “plenary indulgence,” a type of forgiveness for their sins.
Pope Francis then presided over the Christmas Eve mass in St. Peter’s, where he turned once again to the victims of war.
“We think of wars, of machine-gunned children, of bombs on schools and hospitals,” he said in his homily.
The pope had drawn an angry response from Israel at the weekend for condemning the “cruelty” of Israel’s strikes in Gaza that killed children.
He was due to deliver his traditional Christmas Day blessing, Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world), at midday on Wednesday.
Some 700 security officers are being deployed around the Vatican and Rome for the Jubilee celebrations, with measures further tightened following Friday’s car-ramming attack on a Christmas market in Germany.
Much of Rome has also been given a facelift in preparation, with monuments such as the Trevi Fountain and the Ponte Sant’Angelo cleaned up and roads redesigned to improve the flow of traffic.
Many residents have questioned how the Eternal City — where key sites are already overcrowded and public transport is unreliable — will cope with millions more visitors next year.
Key Jubilee projects were only finished in the last few days after months of work that turned much of the city into a building site.
Inaugurating a new road tunnel at Piazza Pia next to the Vatican on Monday, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said it had taken a “little civil miracle” to get the project finished in time.
Over the course of the next few days, Holy Doors will be opened in Rome’s three major basilicas and in Catholic churches around the world.
On Thursday, Pope Francis will open a Holy Door at Rebibbia prison in Rome and preside over a mass in a show of support for the inmates.
Organized by the Church every 25 years, the Jubilee is intended as a period of reflection and penance, and is marked by a long list of cultural and religious events, from masses to exhibitions, conferences and concerts.
“It’s my first time in Rome and for me, to be here at the Vatican, I feel already blessed,” said Lisbeth Dembele, a 52-year-old French tourist visiting St. Peter’s Square earlier.
The Jubilee, whose motto this year is “Pilgrims of Hope,” is primarily aimed at the world’s almost 1.4 billion Catholics, but also aims to also reach a wider audience.
Traditions have evolved since the first such event back in 1300, launched by Pope Boniface VIII.
This year, the Vatican has provided pilgrims with online registration and multilingual phone apps to navigate events.


Russia working ‘constantly’ to return Kursk residents: official

Updated 8 sec ago
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Russia working ‘constantly’ to return Kursk residents: official

Russia working ‘constantly’ to return Kursk residents: official
Hundreds were unable to evacuate and are now living in Ukrainian-controlled territory — cut off from communication with Russia
Some relatives this week posted photos of their missing relatives on Russian social media platform VKontakte

MOSCOW: An official in Russia’s Kursk border region partly occupied by Ukraine told AFP that authorities were working “constantly” to secure the return of Russian civilians caught behind the front lines — after facing rare public criticism.
Ukraine launched a surprise offensive into the Kursk region last August, seizing dozens of towns and villages in a shock setback for Moscow.
Hundreds were unable to evacuate and are now living in Ukrainian-controlled territory — cut off from communication with Russia.
In rare displays of public criticism amid Russia’s crackdown on dissent, some of their relatives have taken to speaking out against the authorities over the lack of information and failure to secure their return.
“Federal agencies and structures, and also the government of the Kursk region, are carrying out constant work in order to achieve concrete results in searching for and returning residents of Kursk region, with whom relatives have lost contact,” Kursk’s acting information minister, Mikhail Shumakov, said in a letter, dated Tuesday, sent to AFP.
He was replying to a request to comment on accusations from a Kursk woman, Lyubov Prilutskaya, who is campaigning to raise attention of the issue through posts on social media and interviews.
Her parents, who lived in a border village captured by Ukraine, have been missing since August.
Some relatives this week posted photos of their missing relatives on Russian social media platform VKontakte, saying around 3,000 civilians remain in Kyiv-controlled areas of the front-line Sudzha district.
They urged “the leadership of the two countries and international organizations to help save the lives of our family members.”
Kursk authorities in their letter acknowledged a list of 517 missing people published by rights ombudswoman Tatiana Moskalkova was “not comprehensive.”
A Ukrainian military spokesman for Kursk said this month that around 2,000 civilians remained in Kyiv-held territory.
Dozens of local residents forced to leave their homes by Ukraine’s offensive held protests in the main city of Kursk on Saturday and Tuesday, complaining about poor conditions for evacuees and demanding direct dialogue with authorities.

Saudi Arabia set to finance bridge construction in eastern Sri Lanka

Saudi Arabia set to finance bridge construction in eastern Sri Lanka
Updated 10 min 4 sec ago
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Saudi Arabia set to finance bridge construction in eastern Sri Lanka

Saudi Arabia set to finance bridge construction in eastern Sri Lanka
  • Saudi Fund for Development previously financed Kinniya Bridge, Sri Lanka’s longest
  • Kingdom has helped finance various projects and granted development loans to the country

COLOMBO: Saudi Arabia is to finance a bridge construction project in Sri Lanka’s eastern district of Trincomalee, the Kingdom’s envoy in Colombo said on Thursday.

Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development and the Saudi Fund for Development have signed a revised agreement for a $10.5 million infrastructure project in the coastal town of Kinniya that will connect it to the Kurinchakerny peninsula.

The ministry announced on Wednesday: “(Some) $10.5 million has been allocated for the construction of Kurinchakerny Bridge, facilitating the transport and business needs of approximately 100,000 residents.”

The funds were repurposed from an earlier project between the Sri Lankan government and the SFD, the Saudi Ambassador to Sri Lanka Khalid bin Hamoud Al-Kahtani said.

The Kingdom previously funded the reconstruction of the Peradeniya-Badulla-Chenkaladi road in Sri Lanka, which connected the country’s eastern, middle and southern provinces. The massive project, which helped improve road safety and mobility in the island nation, was completed in 2021.

“The balance left from the project has been given for the construction of the project on a request made by the Sri Lankan government,” Al-Kahtani told Arab News.

“Through the revised agreement, it is expected to transfer funds that remained in the aforesaid project … and to mobilize the same towards construction of the Kurinchakerny Bridge (in Kinniya). It is envisaged to provide solutions to many transport difficulties.” 

Saudi Arabia has helped finance over a dozen projects in Sri Lanka, covering education, water, energy, health and infrastructure. The SFD has also granted at least 15 development loans to the island nation, worth more than $425 million in total.

In Trincomalee, the new bridge will be the second financed by the Kingdom after the Kinniya Bridge. At 396 meters it is the longest bridge in Sri Lanka and was opened in 2009.

A.L. Ashraff, a Kinniya-based journalist, said that the Kinniya Bridge had “triggered the region’s economic and cultural development.” 

The Kurinchakerny Bridge, he said, was a “fantastic gift for the thousands of people in Kinniya, which would make their daily life easier.”


5 treated after stabbing in south London, 1 man arrested

5 treated after stabbing in south London, 1 man arrested
Updated 19 min 33 sec ago
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5 treated after stabbing in south London, 1 man arrested

5 treated after stabbing in south London, 1 man arrested
  • Metropolitan Police said that a man was arrested following the stabbing in Croydon
  • Authorities didn’t provide a motive for the stabbing

LONDON: Five people have been treated following a stabbing Thursday morning in south London, according to London’s Ambulance Service.
London’s Metropolitan Police said that a man was arrested following the stabbing in Croydon, which British media reports said happened near an Asda supermarket. Authorities didn’t provide a motive for the stabbing.
The ambulance service said that one person was taken to a major trauma center in London and four other people were hospitalized.
“We sent a number of resources to the scene, including ambulance crews, a paramedic in a fast response car, an incident response officer, members of our Tactical Response Unit and London’s Air Ambulance,” the service said.
The violence came on the same day that a teenager faced sentencing for fatally stabbing three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed summer dance class in the northwestern English town of Southport.


Police in Hungary investigate bomb threats affecting over 240 schools

Police in Hungary investigate bomb threats affecting over 240 schools
Updated 23 January 2025
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Police in Hungary investigate bomb threats affecting over 240 schools

Police in Hungary investigate bomb threats affecting over 240 schools
  • The threats, which came in the form of emails, were identical in their text
  • Officers were being dispatched to all affected institutions

BUDAPEST: Police in Hungary said Thursday they were investigating bomb threats that were sent to more than 240 schools across the country, resulting in classes being canceled at some schools.
The threats, which came in the form of emails, were identical in their text and likely sent by a single sender, police said in a statement. Officers were being dispatched to all affected institutions. No explosives or explosive devices were found in the buildings inspected so far, police added.
Gergely Gulyás, chief of staff to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, said that “education in most schools in the country proceeds smoothly,” and that school administrators could decide for themselves whether to send students home.
He said Orbán on Thursday had consulted repeatedly with the interior minister and the minister in charge of Hungary’s secret services.
The emails were sent from numerous email providers “including foreign ones,” Gulyás said. Hungarian secret services were in consultation with their counterparts in neighboring Slovakia, where similar bomb threats were made last year, Gulyás said.
On Wednesday, numerous schools in around a dozen cities in Bulgaria also received bomb threats, according to Bulgarian public broadcaster BNT.


Kyiv claims Russian forces killed six captured Ukrainian troops

Kyiv claims Russian forces killed six captured Ukrainian troops
Updated 23 January 2025
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Kyiv claims Russian forces killed six captured Ukrainian troops

Kyiv claims Russian forces killed six captured Ukrainian troops
  • Officials both in Moscow and Kyiv have accused the other’s army of carrying out killings
  • “In the video, the occupiers recorded their own crime,” Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets wrote in a social media post

KYIV: Kyiv accused Russian forces on Thursday of killing six captured Ukrainian servicemen and said it was notifying international rights groups of the latest alleged Russian war crime.
Officials both in Moscow and Kyiv have accused the other’s army of carrying out killings of captured soldiers in violation of international law.
The Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets made the allegations referring to footage circulating on social media that appears to show Russian troops shooting unarmed Ukrainian troops to death.
“In the video, the occupiers recorded their own crime — shooting six Ukrainian soldiers who were captured in the back,” he wrote in a social media post.
The video, which has spread across social media, could not be verified by AFP and there was no immediate comment from Moscow on the claims.
It appears to show Russian soldiers in a muddied frontline area ordering the Ukrainian troops to a clearing where they are then shot in the back one by one.
“I am once again sending information about this crime to the UN and the ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross). These facts must be recorded,” Lubinets added.