The Latest: Mourners race to get standing room spot in St. Peter's Square for Pope Francis' funeral
The funeral is set to start at 10 a.m. local time.
Here is the latest:
Ukrainian President Zelenskyy arrives in Rome for papal funeral
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived in Rome to attend the funeral of Pope Francis.
Advertisement
His press office confirmed his arrival, joining the first lady Olena Zelenska, who preceded him.
Zelenskyy's presence was put in doubt after a recent missile attack.
Pope's Casket will be placed on the back of a popemobile used on a Philippines trip
The pope will get one more ride past the faithful on one of his beloved popemobiles.
The Vatican says for Saturday's burial procession, his casket will be placed on the back of a popemobile used during his 2015 trip to the Philippines.
The vehicle has been modified so the casket will be visible to mourners along the nearly 4-kilometer (2.5-mile) route from St. Peter's Basilica to his place of burial.
The pope reveled in being driven through crowds of faithful whether in St. Peter's Square or on one of his many foreign trips. His last was on Easter Sunday, when he looped around St. Peter's Square to the delight of the faithful who had followed his 5-week hospitalization for pneumonia and his recovery at the Vatican.
Advertisement
A Calabria parish group camped out all night to get a good spot
The 13 spent the night in a nearby square. They were already coming to Rome for the planned canonization of the first millennial saint on Sunday, which was suspended by Francis' death. Instead, they drove up a day early for his funeral.
'The Lord wanted it this way, so we came all the same,'' said Sandra De Felice of Anoia in the Calabria region. 'For me, this is a sign that we need to be truly humble and charitable. Otherwise, we are nothing.'
Mourners race to find a spot in St Peter's Square
Ordinary mourners streamed Saturday to get a spot in standing room near the rear of the square surrounding the ancient obelisk, behind VIP seating. The area to the left of the main altar, up the basilica steps, is reserved for celebrants and Catholic hierarchy, while world leaders and royalty will be seated on the right.
Many ran toward the square as barricades opened. Some carried banners for the Jubilee Holy Year that Francis opened in December and will continue despite his death Monday following a stroke.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Los Angeles Times
18 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
At least 34 killed in attack on Congo church by Islamic State-backed rebels, official says
GOMA, Congo — The death toll from an attack on a Catholic church in eastern Congo by Islamic State-backed rebels has risen to 34, according to a civil society leader. 'The bodies of the victims are still at the scene of the tragedy, and volunteers are preparing how to bury them in a mass grave that we are preparing in a compound of the Catholic church,' Dieudonne Duranthabo, a civil society coordinator in Komanda, in the Ituri province, told the Associated Press. At least five other people were killed in an earlier attack on the nearby village of Machongani, where a search is ongoing. 'They took several people into the bush; we do not know their destination or their number,' Lossa Dhekana, a civil society leader in Ituri, told the AP. Both attacks are believed to have been carried out by members of the Islamic State-allied Allied Democratic Force, or ADF, armed with guns and machetes. The military has confirmed at least 10 fatalities, while local media reports put the total death toll at more than 40. Duranthabo said attackers stormed the church in Komanda town around 1 a.m. Several houses and shops were also burned. Lt. Jules Ngongo, a Congolese army spokesperson in Ituri province, confirmed 10 killed in the church attack. Video from the scene shared online appeared to show burning structures and bodies on the floor of the church. Those who were able to identify some of the victims wailed while others stood in shock. A United Nations-backed radio station said 43 people were killed, citing security sources. It said the attackers came from a stronghold around 7 miles from the center of Komanda and fled before security forces could arrive. Duranthabo condemned the attack 'in a town where all the security officials are present.' He added: 'We demand military intervention as soon as possible, since we are told the enemy is still near our town.' Eastern Congo has suffered deadly attacks in recent years by armed groups, including the ADF and Rwanda-backed rebels. The ADF, which has ties to the Islamic State, operates in the borderland between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo and often targets civilians. The group killed dozens of people in Ituri this month in what a U.N. spokesperson described as a bloodbath. The ADF was formed by disparate small groups in Uganda in the late 1990s amid reported discontent with President Yoweri Museveni. In 2002, following military assaults by Ugandan forces, the group moved its activities to neighboring Congo and has since been responsible for the killings of thousands of civilians. In 2019, it pledged allegiance to Islamic State. The Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo, known as FARDC, which has long struggled against the rebel group, has been facing attacks since the renewed hostilities with the Rwanda-backed M23 rebels. Kabumba and Adetayo write for the Associated Press and reported from Goma and Lagos, Nigeria, respectively. AP writer Saleh Mwanamilongo contributed to this report.
New York Post
18 minutes ago
- New York Post
How the Hunter Biden cover-up continues to this day
In the same week that Hunter Biden burst back onto the public stage to play the victim and lash out at Democrats, we also heard from his one time protector turned reluctant nemesis, Special Counsel David Weiss, with similarly self serving and disingenuous testimony to Congress. Weiss, the former US Attorney in the Bidens' home state of Delaware who presided over the troubled five year investigation into the former First Son, told the House Judiciary Committee that there just wasn't enough evidence to justify charging Hunter under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). His investigators 'couldn't put together a sufficient case,' he said in June testimony released last week. Advertisement That's pretty rich, considering that those very IRS investigators complained bitterly about the obstruction and slow walking they faced on Weiss' watch every time they pursued an investigative trail that led to Joe Biden and the lucrative foreign lobbying Hunter did in his father's name. That's why IRS Supervisory Special Agent Gary Shapley and Special Agent Joseph Ziegler blew up their successful careers and became whistleblowers. Hunter's business model during his father's vice presidency and beyond revolved around foreign lobbying — including for the corrupt Ukrainian energy company Burisma that was paying him a million dollars a year, Chinese government-linked firms BHR and CEFC, and an oligarch client in Romania. Advertisement In fact, the very first email this newspaper published from Hunter's infamous laptop was from a Burisma executive, thanking him for arranging a meeting with his father the previous night. It wasn't just any old meeting, either. Hunter had invited VP Biden to a private dinner at Georgetown restaurant Cafe Milano in April 2015 to meet his partners from Ukraine, Russia and Kazakhstan, as his former 'best friend in business' Devon Archer told Congress. In their upcoming tell-all book, 'The Whistleblowers v the Big Guy,' Shapley and Ziegler point out that, along with that Burisma bombshell, emails and communications they recovered from the laptop showed that Hunter's relationship with DC lobbying shop Blue Star Strategies was tied to his position on the Burisma board and that the firm had been hired 'to influence U.S. government officials on Burisma's behalf.' Advertisement 'These connections raised red flags about potential violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act FARA and any comprehensive warrant would naturally include references to individuals who may have been involved, even tangentially.' And so, when their team drafted a search warrant related to potential FARA violation, Weiss' top U.S. Attorney Lesley Wolf ordered them to remove all references to 'Political Figure 1,' the DOJ pseudonym for Joe Biden. 'Please focus on FARA evidence only. There should be nothing about Political Figure 1 in here,' Wolf wrote in an August 2020 email, according to their whistleblower testimony to Congress. Advertisement Every morning, the NY POSTcast offers a deep dive into the headlines with the Post's signature mix of politics, business, pop culture, true crime and everything in between. Subscribe here! Whenever their investigations might lead to Joe Biden they found subpoenas were denied, interviews were canceled or not allowed, and Hunter's lawyers were tipped off before search warrants could be executed. Prosecutors cited bad 'optics' or questioned whether the 'juice was worth the squeeze' For instance, Shapley testified that Wolf refused to approve a search warrant for a guest house Hunter had been staying in on Joe's palatial Delaware estate as part of FARA-related evidence collection. When they discovered incriminating WhatsApp messages Hunter wrote to a business partner at Chinese energy company CEFC on July 30, 2017, citing his father, the investigators were blocked from using phone location data to confirm that Joe really was in the room. 'I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,' Hunter wrote, demanding $10 million. 'I am very concerned that the Chairman has either changed his mind and broken our deal without telling me or that he is unaware of the promises and assurances that have been made have not been kept.' Advertisement Hunter also threatened that his father would retaliate if the Chinese did not do as he commanded: 'I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction.' Here was Hunter explicitly claiming his father was involved in his business negotiations. Apart from the fact that Joe claimed that he knew nothing about his son's overseas business dealings, Shapley and Ziegler decided there were serious tax implications to the conversation, but they were blocked from pursuing them. They weren't even allowed to find out if Hunter had sent the message from Joe's house. 'The message was clear,' Shapley and Ziegler write in 'The Whistleblowers v. the Big Guy.' 'Although we were investigating Joe Biden's son — who, it seemed, had often involved his father in his shady overseas business dealings — none of our materials were supposed to mention Joe Biden. Advertisement 'Even when we needed material that might be in one of Joe Biden's homes or storage units, we couldn't mention him. The document might leak to the press, and that would make the Biden campaign look bad. 'And in the summer of 2020, there was nothing that the leadership of the FBI wanted less than to make Joe Biden look bad. Doing so might help elect Donald Trump for a second time.' How different was the way the FBI handled Donald Trump compared to Joe Biden. Whether it was the fake Steele Dossier the FBI treated as if it were legitimate evidence, or the raid on Mar a Lago, there was no concern about the 'optics' of investigating a sitting president or presidential candidate when it was Trump. Advertisement As for FARA, the once little-used law against lobbying the US on behalf of foreign interests has been selectively used to target Trump allies and Democrat enemies. For example, Paul Manafort, former chairman of Trump's 2016 campaign, was charged with FARA. So, too, was Gal Luft, the original Hunter Biden whistleblower, who told FBI and DOJ officials in a March 2019 secret meeting in Brussels that Hunter and his uncle Jim Biden were on the payroll of the Chinese. His accurate information was buried and then, one week before Republicans took back the House in 2022, Luft was charged with FARA and other violations. He is currently languishing in jail in Cyprus while Hunter escaped scot free. Advertisement In the last days of his presidency, Joe issued a uniquely tailored pardon for his son, stretching back 11 years and covering Hunter's conviction on gun charges and guilty plea on felony tax evasion charges that Weiss was forced to press after the sweetheart plea deal he'd stitched together with Hunter's lawyers fell apart in the wake of Shapley and Ziegler's revelations. In the end, Weiss forced the IRS to remove Shapley and Ziegler from the investigation as soon as he suspected Shapley had blown the whistle. The Office of Special Counsel last year determined that the IRS had illegally retaliated against the pair by removing them from the investigation after they made protected disclosures to Congress about DOJ interference in the probe. All the obstruction and interference and slow walking past statutes of limitation happened under the benign leadership of David Weiss. So spare us his mealy mouthed justifications for squibbing what should have been the most consequential political corruption investigation in history.
Newsweek
an hour ago
- Newsweek
Donald Trump Trashed in Scotland's Biggest Newspaper: 'Menace'
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. President Donald Trump's visit to Scotland has drawn intense criticism from Scotland's largest newspaper, The Daily Record, which called him a "menace" in an editorial while also urging U.K. leaders to pursue pragmatic engagement for the sake of long-term relations. Newsweek contacted Trump's team for a response to the report via email. Why It Matters The comments come after Scottish police have told Newsweek a "significant" operation was being planned in expectation of protests against Trump during his time in Scotland, where he will visit his newest golf course. In 2018, thousands of protesters gathered when Trump visited his Scottish golf courses during his first term. President Donald Trump reacts as he plays a round of golf at Trump Turnberry golf course on July 27, 2025 in Turnberry, Scotland. President Donald Trump reacts as he plays a round of golf at Trump Turnberry golf course on July 27, 2025 in Turnberry, Scotland. Getty Images What To Know On the eve of Trump's five-day trip to Scotland, The Daily Record published a strong editorial criticizing his actions. The newspaper described Trump as a "menace who has caused chaos at home and abroad," referencing his refusal to accept defeat in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, perceived support for protesters involved in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, and his public statements regarding foreign leaders including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The editorial also said that Trump's status as a "convicted felon" was contributing to Scottish protesters' outrage. Despite these criticisms, the paper urged leaders such as U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Scotland's First Minister John Swinney to maintain engagement with Trump for economic and diplomatic reasons, citing decades-long U.S.-UK security ties and potential leverage on international issues such as tariffs and foreign conflicts. What People Are Saying Sarah Malone, executive vice president of Trump International, said in a press release sent to Newsweek: "The Trump family has a deep affection for Scotland, not only as the home of golf, but as the ancestral home of President Trump's beloved mother, Mary Anne MacLeod. We are therefore delighted to confirm that we are planning the creation of a memorial garden in honor of Mary Anne MacLeod as a fitting tribute to her name and legacy." Born on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, MacLeod moved to the U.S. in 1930 and became a naturalized citizen in March 1942. What Happens Next Trump's visit is expected to draw protests throughout Scotland, as noted by The Daily Record. U.K. and Scottish leaders face the challenge of balancing domestic opposition to Trump's policies and character with the need to maintain and potentially strengthen critical U.S.-UK relationships.
