ROME, Italy — US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will go to Rome and the Vatican this week, an Italian authorities supply mentioned Sunday, simply weeks after a conflict between Donald Trump and Pope Leo.
Rubio, who’s a Catholic, is anticipated to fulfill Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin and Italian Overseas Minister Antonio Tajani, the supply instructed AFP.
Italian media reported that he would additionally meet Protection Minister Guido Crosetto through the Thursday-Friday go to.
The conferences come a number of weeks after US President Trump’s extraordinary criticism of Pope Leo XIV over the Catholic chief’s anti-war rhetoric.
READ: Trump lambasts Pope Leo, extending feud over Iran battle
Trump additionally dismissed Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni — one in every of his closest European allies — as missing braveness after she defended the US pontiff.
Italian media on Sunday offered Rubio’s go to as a gathering to “thaw” relations.
Since taking on as chief of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics on Might 8, 2025, following the dying of Pope Francis, Leo has criticised the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.
Nevertheless it was his rising anti-war rhetoric, notably following the US-Israeli assault on Iran, that triggered Trump’s ire.
Leo, on April 7, declared Trump’s menace to destroy Iran “unacceptable” and urged Individuals to demand that US lawmakers “work for peace.”
The US president subsequently slammed the pontiff in a social media submit as “WEAK on Crime, and horrible for Overseas Coverage.”
Trump additionally mentioned he was “not an enormous fan of Pope Leo” and that he doesn’t “desire a pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”
READ: Pope Leo says ‘not in my curiosity in any respect’ to debate Trump
Meloni condemned as “unacceptable” Trump’s criticism — prompting the president to show his fireplace on her.
“I’m shocked at her. I assumed she had braveness, however I used to be mistaken,” the US president mentioned in an interview with Italian day by day Corriere della Sera.
He additionally accused Meloni — a far-right chief who has sought to behave as a bridge between diverging US and European views — of failing to assist the USA with Nato.
Trump has threatened to tug US troops from Italy, saying Rome “has not been of any assist to us” within the Iran battle.
He has made the same menace in the direction of Spain, whereas the Pentagon has introduced it’s withdrawing 5,000 US troops from Germany.
