The meeting was held with health safety protocols in place amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
Polish leader Andrzej Duda and Pope Francis meet at the Vatican on Friday, Sept. 25, 2020. Photo: PAP/EPA/VATICAN MEDIA HANDOUT
Duda is visiting Italy and the Vatican on his first foreign trip after being re-elected.
Pope Francis in the Courtyard of St. Damasus at the Vatican ahead of a meeting with the Polish presidential couple on Friday, Sept. 25, 2020. Photo: Grzegorz Jakubowski/KPRP
After the private audience, the Polish president said in a Twitter post that the conversation focused on efforts to strive for peace in the world.
Pope Francis (right) and Poland's President Andrzej Duda (second from left) during a private audience at the Vatican on Friday, Sept. 25, 2020. Photo: PAP/EPA/VATICAN MEDIA HANDOUT
"His Holiness Pope Francis emphasizes that the desire for peace lies deep in people's hearts," Duda tweeted.
"We talked about how everyone, within the limits of their abilities, can strive to act in such a way as to always and everywhere strive for peace," he said.
He added: "This thought also guides me in my decisions.”
Later in the day the Polish head of state and First Lady Agata Kornhauser-Duda were scheduled to attend a Mass at the tomb of St. John Paul II, the Polish-born pope who died in 2005 and was canonized in 2014.
Duda’s three-day trip to Italy and the Vatican began with a stop on Wednesday at the Rome-based Lazzaro Spallanzani National Institute for Infectious Diseases, an Italian research centre on the front lines of the global fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Later that day he held talks with Italian President Sergio Mattarella and Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte.
Duda on Thursday visited a Polish war cemetery at Monte Cassino to pay tribute to soldiers who contributed to a major Allied victory over Nazi German forces after a bloody World War II battle.
Earlier, at the Polish embassy in Rome, he took part in the ceremonial unveiling of a bust of Gen. Władysław Anders, a Polish WWII military leader who died 50 years ago.
While in Rome, Duda also attended a ceremony during which Poland officially joined the International Fund for Agricultural Development.
Duda’s chief of staff, Krzysztof Szczerski, told reporters last week that Poland's decision to become a member of this UN agency was "a gesture of solidarity and a desire to help all starving people around the world.”
Duda told private TV broadcaster Polsat last month that his visit to Italy and the Vatican would be “a very important trip” for him.
“I think many Poles will agree that this is where I should travel at the start of my second term as president," he said at the time.
Duda was sworn into his second term in office before both houses of Poland’s parliament in Warsaw on August 6.
(gs/pk)
Source: IAR