Graphic shows itinerary of Pope’s Francis trip to Asia.
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RELIGION

Pope Francis makes his fourth visit to Asia

By Jordi Bou

November 19, 2019 - November 26, 2019 - Pope Francis is expected to use his fourth visit to Asia to speak out against poverty and human trafficking in Thailand and reiterate his opposition to nuclear weapons in Japan.

The Pope called for a nuclear weapons ban in his 2015 speech to the United Nations General Assembly.

His other Asian visits took him to South Korea in 2014, Sri Lanka and the Philippines in 2015, and Myanmar and Bangladesh in 2017.

In Bangkok he will meet King Maha Vajiralongkorn at Amphorn Royal Palace and government figures and religious leaders who include Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha and the Supreme Buddhist Patriarch. Meetings with Catholic leaders and young people are on his itinerary, and there will be a Mass in the National Stadium.

In Japan, his route takes in Tokyo, then the cities destroyed by United States atom bombs at the end of World War II, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A meeting with victims of the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster in 2011, which followed a magnitude-9 earthquake and catastrophic tsunami in March 2011, is included on his itinerary.

Sources
PUBLISHED: 18/11/2019; STORY: Graphic News; PICTURES: Getty Images
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