VATICAN CITY, July 23. /TASS/. The idea of Pope Francis’ visit to Moscow has been implemented to a certain extent through the mission of his peace envoy Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, who met with Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill, a source in the Vatican City told TASS on Sunday.
"It looks like the very idea [of a visit to Moscow and a meeting with Russian officials] has somewhat exhausted itself after Cardinal Zuppi’s mission," the source said.
The source however recalled that Pope Francis has repeatedly said that he is ready to meet with the Russian and Ukrainian leaders and to visit both capitals. "This readiness stays in place," he added.
The Vatican City said earlier that after visiting Kiev, Moscow, and Washington, the papal envoy is expected to visit Beijing. Details of the would-be visit are still being agreed. According to the Holy See, it is not offering its own peace plan for Ukraine but is trying to bring the parties closer to dialogue mainly through settling humanitarian matters.
In May, Pope Francis received Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, who publicly refused from the Holy See’s mediation proposals.
The Vatican source said that a meeting between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill could be possible "outside the context of the Ukrainian conflict" so that they could focus entirely "on issues of the ecumenical dialogue." Their first meeting was held in February2016. The second meeting was planned to be held in Jerusalem in June 2022. But it became known only after the Pope said in an interview that the meeting had been postponed. Since then, according to the Russian Orthodox Church, no concrete proposals had come from the Vatican City, although Pope Francis said that he hoped to meet with Patriarch Kirill last September on the sidelines of a congress of the leaders of world and traditional religions in Kazakhstan. The Russian patriarch however did not attend the congress and Pope Francis met with Metropolitan Anthony of Volokolamsk, Chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for External Church Relations, who visited the Vatican at least three times after that.