Pope hails IRA statement as 'beautiful news'

Pope Benedict XVI today hailed the IRA’s decision to disarm as “beautiful news” and urged all to work for lasting peace.

Benedict, addressing pilgrims at his summer palace outside Rome, expressed “satisfaction and hope” over the development a few days earlier in which the IRA met international demands to declare its 1997 cease-fire permanent and to renounce violence.

“I encourage everyone without exception to continue to travel down, with courage, the indicated path and to undertake further steps which will allow the strengthening of mutual trust, promote reconciliation and consolidate the negotiations aimed at just and lasting peace,” the Pope said.

He said he was echoing a 1979 call by the late Pope John Paul II to “distance oneself from the paths of violence and return to the road to peace.”