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Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan greets Pope Francis as the pontiff arrives at the presidential palace Friday in Yerevan.
Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan greets Pope Francis as the pontiff arrives at the presidential palace Friday in Yerevan.

Pope denounces Armenian genocide

YEREVAN, Armenia — Pope Francis, on a visit to Armenia, denounced what he called the planned “genocide” of Armenians by Ottoman-era Turks a century ago.

Francis ad-libbed the word “genocide” to his prepared text, listing the Armenian genocide alongside the Holocaust and Stalinism.

“Sadly that tragedy, that genocide, was the first of the deplorable series of catastrophes of the past century, made possible by twisted racial, ideological or religious aims that darkened the minds of the tormentors even to the point of planning the annihilation of entire peoples,” he said in his speech at the presidential palace to President Serzh Sargsyan, Armenian political and religious leaders and the diplomatic corps.

He was given a standing ovation.

“One cannot but believe in the triumph of justice when in 100 years … the message of justice is being conveyed to mankind from the heart of the Catholic world,” said Sargsyn in his speech to the pope.

In the run-up to the visit, the Vatican had refrained from using the term “genocide,” mindful of Turkish opposition to the political and financial implications of the word, given Armenian claims for reparations.

Many historians consider the massacres of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians genocide. Turkey rejects the term and says the death figure is inflated and that people died on both sides as the Ottoman Empire collapsed during World War I.

Captor at German theater fired blanks

BERLIN — German authorities say a masked man who was shot dead after taking captives in movie theater was armed with a rifle and a pistol that fire blanks and dummy grenades.

Darmstadt prosecutors said Friday it was still not clear what motives were behind the seizures, but they had found no evidence the man had a political or terrorist background. They identified the suspect as a 19-year-old German born in Mannheim — about 6 miles from the town where the seizures occurred. They said the suspect lived in northern Germany, but gave no other details.

He was killed by police after taking 18 people captive in the theater in Viernheim and firing blank rounds into the air.

None of the man’s captives was injured.

Island yields potential 2014 flight debris

CANBERRA, Australia — Aircraft wreckage potentially from missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has been found on an island off the East African coast, an Australian official said Friday.

Transport Minister Darren Chester, who oversees the search for the Boeing 777 that vanished in 2014 with 239 people on board, said a “piece of aircraft debris” was found on Pemba Island off the coast of Tanzania.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is conducting the search on Malaysia’s behalf, is seeking further information to determine whether the debris is from Flight 370, Chester said in a statement. It did not say when the debris was found.

Several pieces of the plane have washed up over the past year on coastlines around the Indian Ocean, which have been consistent with drifting models based on the plane having crashed in the Indian Ocean southwest of Australia.

The airliner vanished on March 8, 2014, after flying off course during a flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing.

More debris was found earlier this month washed ashore in Madagascar by a man who previously found a part of Flight 370, but the pieces have yet to be examined by investigators.

Moldovans seize black-market uranium

CHISINAU, Moldova — Moldovan intelligence officials say they have seized an “imposing quantity” of radioactive uranium from a criminal group and detained several people.

The Moldovan Intelligence and Security Service on Friday said the uranium was due to be sold for $210,000 but did not say how big the haul was.

In a statement, it said “a criminal group specializing in smuggling radioactive substances was uncovered.”

It said there was an ongoing investigation into where the uranium came from and how the detained people got involved.

An investigation by The Associated Press revealed in 2015 that there have been at least four attempts in the past five years in which criminal networks with suspected Russian ties sought to sell radioactive material to extremists through Moldova.

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