John Paul II will also sign the “Venice Declaration”, together with the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, on the afternoon of 10 June, at the end of the Symposium, “A Sea at risk, unity of intentions”, promoted by the Patriarchate and dedicated this year to the Adriatic Sea. The announcement was made by an communiqué put out by the press room of the Holy See in recent days (cf. SirEurope no. 21/2002). The document will be signed simultaneously thanks to a special television link between Rome and the Palazzo Ducale in Venice. “The six countries washed by the Adriatic says the Vatican’s press release comprise one of the richest nations and some of the poorest of Europe; the problems they pose therefore range from the questions posed by an advanced industrial economy to the problems faced by the developing countries and those that have arisen after the recent conflicts [in the Balkans]”.
