Pope set for Kenya, Uganda and CAR on first African visit

Pope Francis will visit Kenya in November, the Vatican said yesterday – a country where Christians have recently been targeted by Islamist militants.

In June, the Argentine pontiff told a gathering of priests from around the world that he wanted to go to Kenya as part of his first papal trip to Africa, but that the visit was “uncertain” because there were “organisational problems”.

Francis did not explain further what these problems were, but was speaking two months after Somali militants al-Shabaab targeted Christians during a shooting at a Kenyan university in which 148 students were killed.

The pontiff will go to Kenya on November 25, before travelling to Uganda on November 27 and arriving in the Central African Republic, the final stop on the trip, on November 29.