Pope adds 10 more saints in mass at St Peter’s

Rome: Pope Francis created 10 new saints yesterday, overcoming knee pain that has forced him to use a wheelchair to hold the first canonisation ceremony at the Vatican in more than two years.

Francis stood for a long period at the start of the ceremony to greet priests for mass, then hobbled to the altar to proclaim six men and four women saints.

They include a Dutch priest who was killed by the Nazis, a lay Indian convert who was killed for his faith, and half-adozen French and Italian priests and nuns who founded religious orders.

Francis told the crowd of an estimated 45,000 in St Peter’s Square in Rome that the 10 embodied holiness in everyday life, and said the Church needs to embrace this idea rather than an unattainable ideal of personal achievement.

The ceremony was evidence that Francis is still able to walk, but he appears to be taking it as easy as possible to let the ligaments heal before an intense period of travel starting in July.

The Vatican has confirmed two trips that month, one to Congo and South Sudan, and one to Canada.

Beirut: Voters went the polls in Lebanon yesterday to elect a new parliament against a backdrop of economic meltdown.

People began casting their ballots shortly after the polls opened under the watchful eye of security forces.

The vote is the first since Lebanon’s implosion started in October 2019, triggering widespread antigovernment protests.

It was also the first election since the massive August 2020 explosion at Beirut’s port that killed more than 200 people, injured thousands and destroyed parts of the capital.

Three-quarters of the country’s six million people, including one million Syrian refugees, now live in poverty.

Yesterday, the country’s plight was clear in the northern city of Tripoli, Lebanon’s most impoverished city, where several polling stations were without electricity.

Tel Aviv: Uri Savir, a prominent Israeli peace negotiator and dogged believer in the need for a settlement with the Palestinians, has died aged 69. No cause of death was given.

As director of the country’s foreign ministry, Mr Savir led an Israeli delegation to negotiate a series of interim agreements with Palestinians in 1993 that became known as the Oslo Accords.

The accords created the Palestinian Authority and set up self-rule areas in the Palestinian territories.

Despite hopes for Palestinian statehood dimming since then, Mr Savir remained committed to the vision of a two-state solution until the end.

Dubai: Oil giant Saudi Aramco’s profits soared more than 80 per cent in the first three months of the year, as the statebacked company cashed in on soaring oil prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The bumper firstquarter earnings by the firm show a record net income of $39.5 billion (£32.2bn) – up from $21.7bn (£17.7bn) in the same period last year.

The figures mark the oil group’s highest quarterly profit since 2019, when the Saudi government, which owns 98% of the company, listed a sliver of its worth on Riyadh’s Tadawul stock exchange.