Canada indigenous group meets Pope

VATICAN CITY: Canada’s Red River Métis indigenous people met Pope Francis yesterday and accepted his apology for the Roman Catholic Church’s role in Canada’s residential schools, which sought to erase their cultures and where many children suffered abuse.

The group, also known as the Manitoba Métis, came to Rome separately from other Canadian delegations, who met the pope over a week of meetings ending April 1, when he issued a historic apology.

Francis is to visit Canada at the end of the July and apologise on indigenous land. The aim of the schools, which operated between 1831 and 1996, was to assimilate indigenous children.