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About 250,000 mourners pay final respects to Pope Francis, Vatican says
On his final day of lying in state before his funeral, tens of thousands of people poured into St. Peter’s Basilica to pay him a final homage.
The basilica’s doors were only shut for three hours overnight, but the building remained open until Friday morning for the majority of Thursday night into Friday.
Long lines spanned St. Peter’s Square and the nearby streets before being escorted through the basilica’s central altar, where Francis’s open coffin was on a Friday dais.
People were rushing forward slowly, some even waiting for hours to arrive for a brief moment to pay their respects to Francis.
The 88-year-old pope’s body was delivered to St. Peter’s on Wednesday in a somber procession after suffering a stroke on Monday in his rooms at the Vatican’s Santa Marta guesthouse.
Around 250, 000 people from all over the world have since said goodbye to the pontiff, according to the Vatican.
According to Patricio Castriota, a visitor who is from Argentina and like the pope, “it’s a very strong feeling (to be here).” “I’m so sorry for this farewell, but I’m so grateful that I got to see him.”
He is the only pope to have come from South America and had many admirable intentions for the Catholic Church, Castriota said. He attempted to clear up some of the bad (some of it), though not entirely.
Francis, who became pope in 2013, was known for his endearing and even humorous demeanor as the first pontiff of the Western Hemisphere.
His 12-year papacy was occasionally turbulent, with Francis attempting to reform a divided institution while battling traditionalists who opposed his numerous reforms.
Cardinal Francois-Xavier Bustillo, who is the church’s pastor on the French island of Corsica, said, “He humanized the church, without desacralizing it.”
When St. Peter’s Square was closed just before the viewing period was over, hundreds of disappointed residents were turned away. On Friday, a formal rite to seal the late pope’s coffin was held before 7 p.m. (17:00 GMT).
Hoda Abdel-Hamid, a journalist for Al Jazeera, reported from the Vatican that the cardinals were supposed to attend a private ceremony to complete the coffin.
Twelve coins representing the papacy’s year will be buried inside the coffin. A paper describing his papacy and legacy will also be present, she added.
About 50 heads of state and 10 reigning monarchs were among the at least 130 foreign delegations confirmed their attendance at Pope Francis’s funeral on Saturday, according to the Vatican.
Donald Trump, the president of the United States, will face leaders like Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy in his unanticipated first foreign trip of his second term, which will take him to Rome for the funeral.
At the funeral will be Emmanuel Macron, the former leader of France and former German chancellor Olaf Scholz, along with Ursula von der Leyen and Antonio Costa, both of whom have been senior European Union officials.
As Trump looms over Canadian elections, affordability a key factor
Vancouver, Canada – Leslie Macfarlane claimed last year that she and her husband were experiencing “absolute rage” before fear when she learned they were being removed from a mobile home park in a Vancouver suburb.
Her residence was scheduled to be destroyed as part of the massive redevelopment of a low-rise apartment building.
The 67-year-old retiree was aware of the difficulty of finding rental housing in the notoriously expensive Lower Mainland. Her housing search turned out to be futile, she correctly predicted.
According to Macfarlane, “We couldn’t afford anything.”
For an apartment with half the space, the couple’s housing costs would have nearly tripled, going from about $1,100 to $3,000. The pair made the decision to relocate to Gibsons, a small coastal British Columbian town, where Macfarlane was born and raised.
“If you had a job, you could afford a place to rent,” I recall when raising my kids. You might not be able to afford a lot of rent, but it is still possible. According to Macfarlane, that is no longer the case.
The small town’s costs, which are only accessible by ferry, are “higher on everything,” according to Macfarlane, especially for groceries.
She has been buying less as the price of groceries rises.
“We’re getting to the point where we’re replacing carts with hand baskets of food each week.”
The two biggest issues facing Macfarlane are affordability of housing and the rising cost of groceries, according to the federal election scheduled for April 28.
Post-pandemic inflation
When Justin Trudeau was first elected in 2015, he had promised “sunny ways,” but many Canadians have since been plunged into inflationary shock as a result.
The cost of consumer goods has dramatically increased since Trudeau’s re-election in 2021. The largest annual change since 1983, a yearly change, was 8.1 percent higher than the previous year during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Statistics Canada, in June 2022. Tiff Macklem, the governor of the Bank of Canada, attributed the high inflation to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as shipping delays and pandemic-related delays.
Actual prices are still much higher than they were in 2020 despite a slower inflation rate and a 2.3% increase since then.
Canadians have had trouble adjusting to the rising living costs.
According to David Macdonald, senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, consumers experience the effects more profoundly when they regularly purchase goods like food and gasoline.
He claimed that “people take that inflation more personally.”
Prior to the pandemic, affordability of housing in Canada had been a top concern, but Macdonald claimed that interest rates had increased as a result as interest rates were raised by the Bank of Canada.
Rates increased to 5% in 2023 before starting to increase in 2022. The Bank of Canada finally cut rates midway through 2024, which is now 2.75 percent.
You weren’t safe anywhere, according to Macdonald. “Even if you were renting or owning, both sides were suffering significantly higher interest rates,” said one witness.
According to Macdonald, rent increases have been “mind-boggling” in some important Canadian cities like Toronto and Vancouver.
Average asking rents in Canada have increased by almost 18% since March 2020.
Regardless of country or political ideology, inflation has bad news for politicians in power, according to Macdonald.
According to Macdonald, “inflation didn’t just happen here; it also happened everywhere.” “You got pummeled at the election box in the next election if you were in power during that time.”
pressures from immigration
Some Canadians began to criticize Trudeau’s high immigration goals as a cause of the nation’s out-of-touch housing costs.
According to Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, the population grew almost three times as quickly as the housing stock did last year. Under Trudeau, he has criticized the “massive uncontrolled population growth” that “strained our housing, healthcare, and job markets.”
According to Irene Bloemraad, a professor of political science and sociology at the University of British Columbia and co-director of the Centre for Migration Studies, Trudeau had been elected on a platform that included making the immigration debate more inclusive and multicultural.
Immigration numbers increased until 2020, when the pandemic resulted in a “dramatic drop” in immigration.
According to Bloemraad, Canadian businesses, universities, and provincial governments felt a great need for more workers, students, and others as the country’s economy began to expand in 2021, particularly after a brief period of slow migration.
The number of temporary visas for employees and students has quickly increased thanks to the federal government.
According to her, “there is an argument that the government overshot, that they were just too aggressive in doing this,” given how the rapid influx of new residents in particular metropolitan areas impacted those housing markets.
In a late-2024 Environics poll, 48% of Canadians thought the country accepted too many immigrants, up from 27% in 2022.
Because it is immediately identifiable, immigration is a common target for people’s worries, according to Bloemraad. “People forget that housing costs were also extremely high prior to COVID.” This has not just happened, according to the statement.
In October of last year, Trudeau’s administration announced a reduction in immigration projections, setting a target of 395, 000 permanent residents by 2025 from the anticipated 485, 000 permanent residents by 2024. The reduction was more of a reset than a significant shift in direction, according to Blemraad, who noted that the numbers for 2025 are currently a little higher than they were in 2019.
The affordability crisis worsens.
Shahad Ishak, a resident of Toronto, claimed that Trudeau may have gotten off track with his election promises.
She told Al Jazeera, “He sold a lot of promises to people.”
She had the opportunity to purchase a home when she immigrated to Canada from Kuwait in 2013.
“But it only got worse there.” Never will I purchase a home at this time in my life.
And settling in Canada wasn’t simple.
Because the landlord refused to rent to her without a credit history in 2016, she was forced to use her savings and make payments six months in advance. She also encountered obstacles before because she had no prior experience in Canada.
She was required to work in “very harsh conditions,” including one at a call center.
Despite having almost nine years of experience working in corporate banking in Kuwait, she was eventually hired as a bank teller.
She had to work weekends and her job only offered her the minimum wage. She eventually resigned because it made no sense to work as a weekend babysitter for her two children. Hashak returned to school and is pursuing a sociology PhD.
Four of her close friends, all engineers, immigrated because of the cost-cut crisis.
How do people survive here, Ishak said, “makes me wonder”? because the pay is insufficient.
She anticipates that the upcoming administration will give more of the cost of renting housing a priority.
Ishak points out that this election feels different because of the current economic crisis and because foreign policy will play a significant role.
Trudeau calls it quits
Trudeau resigned as party leader in January after the Liberal Party experienced political unrest and disappointing poll results.
According to a Nanos poll, Conservative Party leader Poilievre, who had waged an aggressive campaign to remove Trudeau, was on track to win a “comfortable” majority.
Much of Poilievre’s sails were taken away by Trudeau as he stepped down. The Conservatives’ “huge” advantage sank in the direction of freedom.
Canadians have downgraded affordability on their list of election priorities as a result of the growing concern over tariffs and annexation threats from US President Donald Trump.
Liberal Prime Minister Mark Carney’s replacement, Justin Trudeau, is now in the lead in the polls, benefiting from the perception that the public would be the best choice to negotiate with Trump.
The economist Macdonald claimed that Trudeau leaving may have “washed this election” of inflationary rage in some ways.
According to Macdonald, “Regular people are still really upset that grocery store prices are 30% higher than they were five years ago.” He continued, “Canadians are probably angrier with the US at this time.”
UN says its food stocks in Gaza completely ‘depleted’ amid Israeli blockade
As Israel’s aid blockade lasts for an eighth week, the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) claims that its food stocks in Gaza are completely exhausted.
The WFP confirmed in a statement on Friday that it had “delivered its last remaining food stocks” in Gaza to neighborhood kitchens, which it anticipates will run out of completely “in the coming days.”
In Gaza, according to the organization’s Palestine representative Antoine Renard, more than 400 000 people rely on WFP aid, leaving them with little recourse if this lifeline fails.
He claimed that “all of us local NGOs are in short.” “We are being exhausted,”
Israel has completely blocked all humanitarian aid from entering Gaza since March 2, violating a 2024 World Court order to facilitate the movement of aid, including food, medicine, and fuel.
The WFP reports that the food stockpiled following a nearly two-month ceasefire earlier this year has largely been exhausted, while the price of the little food that is still available has increased by 1,400%.
Hani Mahmoud, a journalist from Gaza City, claimed that there were numerous cases of hunger and malnutrition.
“People are hungry,” he said. He claimed that they are already rationing supplies. Families running out of supplies are also at risk, according to the statement.
It’s “hard to imagine” how the hundreds of thousands of families relying on the WFP’s daily meals are “going to get by,” he continued.
The dwindling food supply may lead to the starvation of “thousands of Palestinian families,” according to Gaza’s government media office.
According to the report, 50 children and 52 people have already died as a result of malnourishment and hunger, while over one million children per day are affected by this.
‘Intolerable’
Israel has not shown any signs of reversing the blockade despite the humanitarian crisis. Israel Katz, the country’s defense minister, stated last week that Israel would continue to block aid and that it was a “pressure” tactic used by Hamas.
Israel’s military has repeatedly alleged Hamas of stealing aid, which the organization denies, and demands that it keep all supplies a secret to stop the fighters from obtaining it.
Even some of Israel’s closest allies have publicly decried the strategy, though. Germany, France, and the United Kingdom all collectively condemned the action on Wednesday and expressed concern that it would “accrobate the risk of starvation, epidemic disease, and death”
Numerous Israeli attacks result in the death of victims.
Israeli attacks spread throughout the war-torn enclave as the food crisis grew worse. According to the Gaza Government Media Office on Friday, at least 78 people have died in the past 24 hours. According to local media reports, this included a woman killed by a quadcopter attack close to the Jabalia refugee camp and 15 people who were the victims of air raids on homes in Khan Younis.
According to sources who were cited by the Reuters news agency, efforts to restart the stalled ceasefire talks in Cairo continued. A Hamas delegation was scheduled to arrive in Cairo on Friday.
Hamas insists on a permanent ceasefire, while Israel only offers temporary truces and demands that Hamas disarm, something the organization rejects.
According to Reuters, mediators are currently developing a new proposal that would call for the end of fighting and the release of all captives in Gaza, according to several knowledgeable sources.
More than 1,900 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks since the ceasefire ended on March 18, according to Gaza’s health authorities, and hundreds of thousands have been displaced as a result of Israel’s annexation of what it refers to as a buffer zone.
Trump eyes diplomacy in Rome at Pope Francis’s funeral
While he is in Rome for Pope Francis’s funeral, US President Donald Trump says he plans to meet with foreign leaders. He emphasized his desire to end trade deals as he left the White House and disclosed to reporters that progress is being made in the Russia-Ukraine negotiations and Iran.
‘Ciao Papa’: Rome gears up to bid farewell to Pope Francis
Crowds have filled St Peter’s Square in the Vatican since the pope’s death was announced on Monday, and the entire city-state is abuzz with activity.
Many visitors have viewed Pope Francis’s body, which has been lying in state since Wednesday, while others appear content to take a selfie in front of the towering Tuscan colonnades that border the plaza.
Teams of ambulance personnel, mounted police officers, members of the Swiss Guard – the Vatican’s own army – and Italian special forces, some of whom carry intimidating-looking anti-drone weapons, line the plaza.
In St Peter’s Square, Al Jazeera spoke to people from many countries, including Morocco, Kenya, and the US.
Some had travelled to Rome upon hearing news of the pope’s death, but many were either living in or visiting Rome. Some had extended their stay so they could attend the funeral.
Francisco Horfa, a 33-year-old theology student from the Southeast Asian nation of East Timor, was in Rome to be ordained as a deacon on May 7.
He proudly waved the red, yellow, and black East Timor flag with a compatriot in the plaza as he described this period of mourning as “emotional and full of prayer”.
He said the pope had visited his home country in September and had left a “great impression” on its people.
About half of the nation’s 1.3 million population was reported to have attended his mass on the outskirts of the capital Dili, as he celebrated the nation for its reconciliation with its neighbour Indonesia, from which it achieved independence in 2002.
Annalia Alia, a 69-year-old woman from the Philippines and a devout Catholic, had seen Pope Francis when he visited the Southeast Asian country in 2015.
Now, 10 years later, she had seen his body lying in an open wooden coffin at St Peter’s Basilica’s main altar.
“It feels like everything has come full circle, I saw him in life and now I saw him in death”, she said. It had been an “indescribable and emotional experience”, she added.
She had come to Rome for the Jubilee, when pilgrims from around the world travel to the city to seek spiritual renewal.
During the Jubilee year, the Holy Doors at Rome’s four major papal basilicas are opened, allowing pilgrims to pass through them to receive a plenary indulgence (a forgiveness of sins).
Flanked by her two daughters, she said she felt fortunate to have been in Rome when the pope died, but wanted to go to her hotel to rest, as she felt overwhelmed.
Ernest Damasco, a 55-year-old pilgrim also from the Philippines, said he had come to Rome “with the hope of seeing the pope wave from the balcony (overlooking St Peter’s Square), but instead it feels like I have lost a father, a great leader who was inspirational to me”.