Turkish police detain at least 474 people. In Afrin, four people died in gunfight between protesters and Turkish troops. Violence was triggered by reports that went viral on social media concerning sexual abuse by a Syrian refugee against a minor. The case reflects the growing intolerance towards foreigners in Turkey.

This is according to the latest UN report 'Children and Armed Conflict' soon to be published. Since last year, YPG militiamen continue to detain more than 800 minors under the pretext of 'association' with other armed groups. Violations and abuses at an "alarming" level throughout the country, violations of child rights. 

The vote was initially scheduled for 11 June. The Election Commission has delayed it "at least until August" but without any official confirmation. Critics accuse Kurdish groups of separatism and seeking to monopolise power.

Donor countries meet to discuss Syria, but the country's ‘forgotten war’ continues to provoke suffering and the flight of its population (about 500 a day). Speaking to AsiaNews, the apostolic nuncio in Damascus describes a ‘stagnant political process’ while ‘the only progress is in terms of poverty’. The exodus of Christians ‘another great wound that bleeds’. 

Eight Franciscans and three Maronite brothers were killed together in hatred of the faith in the Bab-Touma neighbourhood in 1860. They symbolise the "ecumenism of blood" that Christians have experienced in the Middle East in the recent past. The pontiff also approved the decrees for the canonisation of 15-year-old Carlo Acutis and Fr Giuseppe Allamano, founder of the Consolata missionaries.

There is still deep disagreement between Lebanon and Brussels over the presence of more than two million people in the country without official documents. The country of the cedars demands their repatriation, while Europe only wants to avert migration to its shores, offering money in exchange. On the table is an aid plan for one billion euros over four years.