VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Pope Benedict XVI, acknowledging the "suffering" of indigenous Latin Americans, moved Wednesday to control damage caused by remarks made during his trip to Brazil, eight months after roiling the Muslim world with comments linking Islam to violence.
One cannot "ignore the suffering and the injustices inflicted by the colonizers on the indigenous populations" whose "fundamental human rights were often trampled on," Benedict said during his weekly general audience.
The pope had said on the last day of his May 9-13 trip to Brazil that "Christianity was not imposed by a foreign culture," drawing a sharp reaction from leaders of indigenous groups to whom the remark smacked of revisionism.