Jean-Louis Tauran, the cardinal who announced Francisco as the new pope, is dead

French cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran who was responsible for announcing to the world the election of Francisco as successor to Benedict XVI died yesterday at 75 as announced this Friday Vatican

The Cardinal, who suffered from Parkinson's disease presided over the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. 19659002]

Because of his high rank, was instructed to announce the election of Bergoglio as new pope on March 13, 2013 with the traditional "Habemus papam", recalls the Biography published by the Vatican.

In 2014, he was appointed camerlegno of the church, that is to say, charged with the transition from death to the election of a pope, that & # 39; 39: he will not be able to accomplish

Tauran the most important French religious of the Roman Curia with a broad diplomatic career after having been Secretary of State Relations for 13 years, a sort of Minister of Foreign Affairs Foreign Office of the Holy See during the pontificate of John Paul II.

"The Bishops of France, they lost a brother in the episcopate, humble servant of the Church, craftsman of a deep and lucid dialogue with other believers ", Said the spokesman of the French episcopate, Olivier Ribadeau Dumas

proclaimed cardinal by John Paul II in 2003, has held the position of President of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue since 2007 at the request Pope Benedict XVI, after relations with the Islamic world deteriorated following the speech of the German Pope at the University of Regensburg Islam.
A scholar and a polyglot recently acknowledged in a conversation with AFP that tumultuous relations with Islam occupied most of his time.

Tauran spent most of his life in the service of the Holy See. Ordained priest in 1969 in Bordeaux, he began his career at the Vatican at the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy in the early 1970s.

Last April, he went to Saudi Arabia, where he met King Salman, the first trip of a representative. Affected by Parkinson's disease for 6 years, he has been decorated on many occasions and has participated in the preparation of several delicate papal journeys, including the history of John Paul II in Cuba in 1998.