Pope Leo XIV opened his first Africa trip with a call for peace in Algeria on Monday, while U.S. President Donald Trump delivered fresh criticism of the pope against the backdrop of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. Leo’s arrival in Algiers marked the start of an 11-day tour that will take him to Algeria, Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea, with a stated aim that includes promoting Christian-Muslim coexistence in a country where Catholics are a small minority.
In his first public remarks in Algiers, Leo tied his message to Algeria’s independence struggle from France, which was reached in 1962. He referenced the revolution’s toll, saying hundreds of thousands died and describing French forces’ actions that included torture of detainees, disappearance of suspects and devastation of villages as part of a strategy to maintain control.
Leo’s speech also laid out a definition of peace that he presented as both moral and political. “God desires peace for every nation, a peace that is not merely an absence of conflict but one that is an expression of justice and dignity,” he told a crowd of several thousand people at the monument to Algeria’s martyrs.
Later, in a meeting with President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and other government authorities, Leo praised Algerians for solidarity and respect, and said that this experience offers perspective today “on the global balance of power.” He then said, “Today, this is more urgent than ever in the face of continuous violations of international law and neocolonial tendencies,” without elaborating, according to the report.
The pope’s trip began amid a widening feud with Trump over the Iran war. Trump said overnight that he did not think Leo was doing a good job as pope and suggested he should “stop catering to the Radical Left,” as the pope made peace appeals tied to ongoing Middle East fighting. Leo responded by saying his appeals for peace and reconciliation are rooted in the Gospel and that he did not fear the Trump administration. As covered in MSI previously reported that Trump criticism intensified around the pope’s Iran-war comments, the dispute has increasingly framed Leo’s messaging for audiences at home and abroad.
Leo’s visit also included a highly visible interfaith moment at the country’s Great Mosque. Reports from Algeria described how the pope’s arrival dominated local news coverage, while he visited the mosque and stood silently with his hands clasped, as if in prayer. He thanked the mosque rector for receiving him in a “divine space, space of God” that is also a study center, and he told those present that, through prayer and study, people can recognize the dignity of every human being and learn to respect one another—adding in Italian that the gathering was “proof” of that.
The pope’s Algeria stop came with references to a violent religious past. Algeria’s civil war in the 1990s, known locally as the “black decade,” killed about 250,000 people as the army fought an Islamist insurgency, including 19 Catholics—among them seven Trappist monks from the Tibhirine monastery south of Algiers, who were kidnapped and killed in 1996. Also killed were two nuns from Leo’s Augustinian religious family, and all 19 were beatified in 2018, described as the first such beatification ceremony in the Muslim world.
During the visit, Leo paid homage to the 19 martyrs and visited the remaining Augustinian nuns who run a social services project out of the Algiers basilica that helps people of all faiths. The reporting also said the Algiers archbishop has noted that Leo was elected on May 8, which falls on the Catholic feast day of the 19 martyrs, and that Vesco invited him to visit shortly after his election.
Local reactions to the significance of the trip varied. Lamia Sellimi, a literature teacher near the Basilica of Our Lady of Africa, said Islam has “illuminated this land for 14 centuries” and that for Algerians, the visit was “merely a circumstantial event.” Other coverage, by contrast, framed the visit as an appeal centered on peace and coexistence.
Leo’s Africa itinerary is designed around his own connection to St. Augustine, whose inspiration helped shape his spirituality and whose birth and early life are tied to what is today Algeria. The report said the Augustinian order was inspired by Augustine, a fifth-century theologian and philosopher born in the region, and that Leo would visit Annaba—modern-day Hippo—on Tuesday to walk in Augustine’s footsteps, including by visiting the site tied to Augustine’s three-decade role as bishop.