HOLY FATHER EXHORTS END TO VIOLENCE IN MIDDLE EAST

VATICAN CITY, OCT 11, 2000 (VIS) - During today's weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square for 38,000 faithful, Pope John Paul referred to the situation in the Middle East and exhorted an end to the violence there:

"With great anguish, we are following the grievous tensions in the Middle East, shaken once again by events that have caused numerous victims and that have not even spared the holy sites.

"Faced by this dramatic situation, I cannot but call on everyone to put an immediate end to this spiral of violence. At the same time, I invite all believers to pray to God that the people and leaders of that region may return to the path of dialogue and rediscover the joy of feeling themselves to be children of God, their common Father."

AG;APPEAL; MIDDLE EAST;...;...;VIS;20001011;Word: 150;