Pope prays for Malaysia Airlines victims in Ukraine

Jul 19th, 2014

Pope Francis is praying for the victims of the deadly incident in Ukraine involving a Malaysia Airlines passenger plane. Malaysia Airlines flight MH17.

The plane crashed on Thursday, killing all 298 people on board, after it was hit by a missile. The Boeing 777 was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. It fell between Krasni Luch in Luhansk region and Shakhtarsk in the neighbouring region of Donetsk.

Latest figures released by Malaysia Airlines show the plane was carrying 189 Dutch nationals, 27 Australians, 44 Malaysians (including 15 crew), 12 Indonesians and 10 Britons, along with a number of other nationalities.

A statement from the Press Office of the Holy See reads: "The Holy Father, Pope Francis has learned with dismay of the tragedy of the Malaysian Airlines aircraft downed in east Ukraine, a region marked by high tensions. He raises prayers for the numerous victims of the incident and for their relatives, and renews his heartfelt appeal to all parties in the conflict to seek peace and solutions through dialogue, in order to avoid further loss of innocent human lives."

Source: VIS/ICN

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