Pope Francis announced on Sunday that the Vatican is involved in a peace mission to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, but declined to give further details.

Speaking to reporters during a flight home after a visit to Hungary, the Pope said that peace is always made by opening channels and that he had spoken about the situation in Ukraine with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and with Metropolitan Hilarion, a representative of the Russian Orthodox Church in Budapest.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Pope Francis has regularly called for peace and expressed his wish to act as a broker between Kyiv and Moscow, although his offer has so far failed to produce any breakthrough. He has also previously said that he wants to visit both Kyiv and Moscow on a peace mission. On his health, the Pope said that he was hospitalized for pneumonia in late March, but that his body responded well to treatment and that there were no changes to his travel plans. Photo by Long Thiên, Wikimedia commons.