News

• 21 May 2003
  ASIA/PAKSITAN - CENTENARY OF FRANCISABAD ST FRANCIS CITY, A LITTLE ASSISI IN PAKISTAN, CHRISTIAN OASIS IN A MAINLY MUSLIM LAND Faisalabad (Fides Service) – A hundred years ago Belgian Capuchin Father Philip came on mission to Pakistan and built a village to which he gave the name of St Francis and which is known locally as Francisabad. Today t ...
• 21 May 2003
  AFRICA/DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO - IN WAR TORN CONGO A MIRACLE…CARITAS PEACE CONVOY RE-UNITES SEPARATED FAMILY MEMBERS Kinshasa (Fides Service) – A humanitarian river convoy carrying persons displaced by war to be re-united with families has safely arrived at its destination Bena-Dibele. The convoy, organised by Caritas Congo, left Kin ...
• 21 May 2003
  EUROPE/SWITZERLAND - SMOKERS ALARM IN DEVELOPING REGIONS, TOBACCO ALREADY KILLS 5 MILLION EVERY YEAR. HISTORY MAKING AGREEMENT TO CLAMP DOWN ON SMOKING Geneva (Fides Service) - The 192 members of the World Health Organization today unanimously adopted the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) aimed at curbing tobacco-related deaths and disease. This is the firs ...
• 21 May 2003
  EUROPE/UKRAINE - “BELIEVERS MUST USE EVERY POSSIBLE LEGAL MEANS TO AVOID THE LOSS OF HUMAN LIFE AND THE HUMILIATION OF HUMAN DIGNITY” SAYS VICE -PRESIDENT OF THE PONTIFICAL ACADEMY FOR LIFE ADDRESSING INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SYMPOSIUM ON BIO-ETHICS Kiev (Fides Service) – Scientists, scholars and journalists from Ukraine, Italy, Poland, Croatia and Belo-Russia took part in a Scientific Symposium promoted by a Ukrainian charitable organisation the Pro-Human Dignity ...
• 21 May 2003
  AFRICA/CONGO - MASSACRES, HUNGER, SCARCITY OF MEDICINES…ANGUISHED CALL FROM NORTH EAST CONGO Bunia (Fides Service) – “Supplies of food and medicine are running out, life in the city is becoming unbearable” a local priest in Bunia tells Fides Service. Bunia has been at the centre of fighting between Hema an ...
• 21 May 2003
  ASIA/INDIA - SCHOOL FOR 5000 PUPILS; IT SCHOOL FOR 3,000; HOME FOR LEPERS; 300 BED HOSPITAL AND NURSING SCHOOL: HERITAGE LEFT BY ITALIAN MISSIONARY WHO SPENT 50 YEARS ON MISSION IN INDIA Lucknow (Fides Service) – Sacred Heart Catholic school with 5,000 pupils; an Information Technology Institute for 3000 students, a 300 bed hospital which also has a Nurses Training School, and a Leper colony run by fif ...
• 20 May 2003
  EUROPE/CROATIA - THIRD PAPAL VISIT TO CROATIA: YET ANOTHER SIGN OF THE POPE’S LOVING CONCERN FOR A CHURCH AND NATION YOUNG BUT GROWING DESPITE DIFFICULTIES Zagreb (Fides Service) – From 5-9 June Pope John Paul II will visit Croatia. This will be his 100th apostolic journey and the third to this Balkan nation. National Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in Croati ...
• 20 May 2003
  EUROPE/ITALY - AT LAST SCHOLARS FROM LA SAPIENZA UNIVERSITY PROVIDE CLEAR INFORMATION ABOUT SARS: HOW IT SPREADS, WHAT SHOULD WE WORRY ABOUT, WHAT TO DO TO AVOID IT Roma (Fides Service) – A group of Virologists at the Clinic of Infectious Diseases at the La Sapienza in Rome have prepared for Fides Service a report on the main characteristics of SARS, sources of infection, diagnosi ...
• 20 May 2003
  ASIA/INDIA - MORE THAN 700 PEOPLE ATTEND PRESENTATION OF ALBERIONE AWARD TO “OUTLOOK” WEEKLY, COMMITTED TO PEACE AND SOCIAL HARMONY IN INDIA Bombay (Fides Service) – The journalism award named after the founder of the Pauline Family, Blessed Giacomo Alberione, beatified 27 April, was assigned to Outlook an Indian culture and news weekly in a ceremony in Bom ...
• 20 May 2003
  ASIA/INDIA - TURA DIOCESE HAS A SCHOOL, A CHURCH AND A SMALL HOSPITAL NAMED AFTER PADRE PIO, MISSIONARY TO THE WORLD Tura (Fides Service) – Padre Pio School in the diocese of Tura in north west India is already fully functioning with intense activity. The local Catholics are deeply devoted to the Franciscan friar, canonised a Saint o ...
• 20 May 2003
  AFRICA/TOGO - BISHOPS CONCERNED ABOUT PEACE IN TOGO UNLESS FREE DEMOCRATIC ELECTIONS ARE GUARANTEED Lome (Fides Service) – On June 1st there will be a presidential election in Togo a country situated on the Gulf of Guinea and which shares borders with Ghana, Benin and Burkina Faso. The election is important and there ...
• 20 May 2003
  AFRICA/IVORY COAST - “LOST YOUTH COMBAT NAMES COSA NOSTRA AND MAFIA ”…SAYS MISSIONARY WHO CRITICISES BEHAVIOUR OF FRANCE IN THIS TRAGEDY Abidjan (Fides Service) – “This is not yet authentic peace” a Comboni Missionary in Ivory Coast tells Fides Service. That country has been in the grip of ferocious civil war since September last year. “Despite th ...
• 20 May 2003
  ASIA/TAIWAN - LOCAL CATHOLIC CENTRE FOR SARS EMERGENCY: CARDINAL SHAN SAYS DO NOT BE AFRAID OF ONE ANOTHER Taipei (Fides Service) – While the situation of the SARS emergency on the Island is ever more critical, the Catholic Church in Taiwan has opened a Catholic Centre for the SARS Emergency. The Centre, opened under the pa ...
• 20 May 2003
  EUROPE/POLAND - CHURCHES FOR THE PROTECTION OF CREATION: FORMATION AND CONCRETE INITIATIVES NEEDED SINCE “THERE CAN BE NO PEACE BETWEEN PEOPLES UNLESS THERE IS PEACE WITH NATURE” Wroclaw (Fides Service) - Some sixty delegates from 22 countries took part in the Consultation on the Environment, entitled “Formation for responsibility towards Creation and Sustainable Development” and organised by ...
• 19 May 2003
  VATICAN - ON HIS 83rd BIRTHDAY POPE CANONISES 4 NEW SAINTS: “OUR LIFE IS CHRIST, LIVING AND PRESENT IN THE CHURCH AND IN THE WORLD, TODAY AND FOR EVER” Vatican City (Fides Service) – On Sunday 18 May, the Holy Father Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass in St Peter’s Square and canonised four new saints, two Poles and two Italians; Bishop Józef Sebastian Pelczar, fou ...