Pope Francis’ trip to the DRC is the first papal visit since John Paul II travelled there in 1985.
Pope Francis is visiting the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and South Sudan this week.
The 86-year-old leader of the Catholic church will start his trip on Tuesday in the Congolese capital Kinshasa before heading to Juba, the capital of South Sudan, on Friday.
The Vatican’s envoy to the DRC, where Catholics make up about half of the population, has said the trip will remind the world not to ignore decades-long conflicts there.
An estimated 5.7 million people are internally displaced in the DRC and 26 million face severe hunger, largely because of the impact of armed conflict by multiple rebel groups, according to the United Nations.
The trip will be Francis’s 40th abroad since he was elected supreme pontiff in 2013 following the resignation of his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI. Over the course of these trips, the pope has visited 59 countries.
Pope Francis’ trip to the DRC is the first visit by a pope since John Paul II travelled there in 1985 – it was still known as Zaire at the time.
The DRC is the second-largest country in Africa and has a population of some 90 million people. The Church runs about 40 percent of the country’s health facilities and about 6 million children are taught in Catholic schools.
