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Monday, May 21, 2007
Venezuelas President Hugo Chavez has demanded an apology from Pope Benedict for statements made this month in Brazil. Chavez says that the Pope must apologise to all Indians in Latin America for saying that the Roman Catholic Church had not imposed itself on the indigenous peoples of the Americas, but had infact purified them. The President accused the Pontiff of making light of the holocaust which he said occurred after Christopher Columbus set foot in the Americas. Millions of tribal Indians are believed to have died as a result of European colonization backed by the Church, through slaughter, disease or enslavement. Indian leaders in the region were outraged by the Popes comments.
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