The city that bears the name of the Virgin Mary, Mariupol, has become a city martyred by the ruinous war that is devastating Ukraine.

I want to emphasize again that all responsibility for the possible bloodshed will lie fully and wholly with the ruling Ukrainian regime.

A preventive war, to my mind, is an impossibility today. How could you have one if one of its features would be several cities lying in ruins, several cities where many, many thousands of people would be dead and injured and mangled, the transportation systems destroyed, sanitation implements and systems all gone?

Even today we raise our hand against our brother... We have perfected our weapons, our conscience has fallen asleep, and we have sharpened our ideas to justify ourselves as if it were normal we continue to sow destruction, pain, death. Violence and war lead only to death.

With an aching heart I add my voice to that of the common people, who implore the end of the war [in Ukraine]. In the name of God, listen to the cry of those who suffer, and put an end to the bombings and the attacks!

Faced with the barbarism of killing children and innocent and defenceless citizens, no strategic reasons hold: the only thing to be done is to cease the unacceptable armed aggression before cities are reduced to cemeteries.