Vatican: Pope Francis visits the United Arab Emirates in February

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Pope Francis in Cairo (Egypt), April 28, 2017, for a "journey of unity and fraternity". REUTERS / Alessandro Bianchi

The pontiff is expected in the United Arab Emirates, the announcement was confirmed Thursday by the Holy See. Pope Francis will participate in an interreligious meeting on the theme of " human fraternity ".

From our Vatican correspondent , Eric Sénanque

The Pope responded positively to the invitation made to him just over two years ago by the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Bin Zayed Al Nahyan , then visiting the Vatican.

If the program of the interreligious meeting is not yet known, its theme will be " Make me an instrument of your Peace ", in the words of the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi, a whole program for the Pope whose Saint -Siege says he will come as " a messenger of peace ". " A perfect example of the culture of the meeting, " promoted tirelessly by Francis, commented the spokesman of the Vatican.

This trip will also take place at the invitation of the small local Catholic community living in the United Arab Emirates (900,000 Christians, 70% of whom are Catholic according to official figures) for the vast majority of Indian or Filipino immigrants. The Emirate has an apostolic vicar and religious freedom is guaranteed: eight Catholic churches were built there in recent years.

As he did in Cairo last year and will do in Morocco at the end of March , Francis will once again address the Muslims, in a new place: never in fact a pope has so far visited a Gulf country.