Cardinal-designate Mario Zenari who is apostolic nuncio to Syria has
said the Pope’s decision to make him a cardinal was a “gesture of love”
for Syrian martyrs.
He has said that by choosing to give him a red cardinal’s hat, Pope
Francis was honouring the people and the steadfast presence of a papal
representative in the war-torn nation.
“It’s a gesture of love for the martyred Syrian population and it is
also a gesture of supporting diplomacy,” Cardinal-designate Zenari told
SIR, the news agency of the Italian bishops’ conference.
Since 2008, Cardinal-designate Zenari has served as the Pope’s
representative in Syria, where armed conflict eventually emerged out of
the escalating unrest following the 2011 Arab Spring.
The conflict involving government forces, jihadist rebel factions and
the Islamic State has left nearly half a million people dead, according
to the Syrian Centre for Policy Research and, according to the UN
refugee agency, UNHCR, at least 7.6 million people have been displaced
internally and more than 4 million people fled the country.
“It’s well noted that the Holy See has always maintained diplomatic
relations during this period” and now, by elevating “his ambassador to
the dignity of cardinal, (the Pope) is giving additional value to this
presence and to the diplomatic efforts aimed at resolving the crisis,”
he said.
“Even if I am Italian, as the nuncio, my homeland is Syria. A son
cannot tear himself away from his mother’s bedside when she is sick or
dying – that is why I stay,” he told Vatican Insider on October 11.
He also told Vatican Insider that, in Damascus, “everything is
polluted, the air, the water, the land. And the people who escape the
bombings or the chemical weapons attacks live under another kind of
bombing – poverty, which hits 80 percent of the people. Half of all the
factories and hospitals have been destroyed.”
When Pope Francis announced the creation of 17 new cardinals October
9, the nuncio’s name was first on the list. The Pope also made a point
of adding that the prelate would “remain apostolic nuncio to the beloved
and martyred Syria.”
With other countries closing so many diplomatic missions over the
past few years, the Pope’s gesture underlined that “staying on, on site,
is important,” the diplomat told AsiaNews the next day.
The 70-year-old prelate said he heard the announcement while he was
having lunch with family and friends in his hometown near Verona, Italy.
“I knew nothing” about the appointment, he said. He heard the news
from his brother-in-law during lunch after Mass. “At first, I didn’t
want to believe it,” he told AsiaNews.
The cardinal-designate has said the world community and Syrian powers
need to do everything possible “because the people are suffering.”
Unfortunately, the lack of willingness “is not so much an uphill
struggle, but it seems that in these conditions, (it) is almost a cliff,
like climbing a wall” to get a negotiated solution.