Iraqi president in Vatican meeting with Pope

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani was to hold talks today with Pope Benedict XVI during an audience at the Vatican.

Talabani is on a week-long visit to Italy and has met with the country’s top officials, including Premier Silvio Berlusconi, and opposition leaders.

The Vatican opposed the war in Iraq, and Benedict’s predecessor, the late Pope John Paul II, spoke out strongly against it.

Talabani said after meeting with Berlusconi that “war is not the best way, but it was the only way to topple Saddam Hussein.” He said Iraqi forces should be ready to begin taking over from coalition troops towards the end of next year.

Benedict met with Iraq’s foreign minister in August at his summer retreat on the hills south of Rome. Those talks focused on the themes of religious freedom in Iraq and the country’s constitution.

Iraqi Christians number about 800,000 – about three per cent of Iraq’s 26 million people. Most of them belong to the Chaldean Church, an Eastern-rite church that is loyal to the Pope but does not follow the Roman church’s Latin rite.