Tehran, 07 January, 2020 / 6:26 pm (ACI Africa).
As tensions escalate between Iran and the United States following the killing of Qasem Soleimani, the pope’s diplomat in Tehran is appealing for dialogue.
Archbishop Leo Boccardi has served as apostolic nuncio to Iran since 2013. Speaking to EWTN News from Tehran, Boccardi said he has been keeping the Vatican updated on the situation on the ground in Tehran with regular dispatches to the Secretariat of State.
“I believe that the words of the Holy Father have been an invitation to moderation, to dialogue, to negotiation to get through the tension and to see, to hope, that there are none of these ... acts of revenge,” Archbishop Boccardi told EWTN News Jan. 6.
The pope called for dialogue and self-control in the “terrible air of tension” in his Angelus address Jan. 5.
Archbishop Boccardi said he does not foresee immediate implications for the small population of Christians living in Iran due to the U.S. drone strike that killed Soleimani, saying it is not a religious conflict. “It is a war that is unfolding between Iran and another particular opponent who has a name and surname,” Boccardi said.