Pope lands in Singapore following visit to East Timor

Pope Francis has flown to Singapore for the final leg of his trip through Asia, arriving in one of the world’s richest countries from one of its poorest after a record-setting final Mass in East Timor.

After a brief farewell ceremony, Francis, the Vatican delegation and journalists traveling with him flew to Singapore aboard local carrier Aero Dili’s only aircraft, an Airbus A320.

It landed about three hours later in Singapore, where Francis had no public events scheduled for the rest of the day.

Francis wrapped up his visit to East Timor with a rally on Wednesday morning of its young people, who make up the majority of the 1.3 million population.

He urged them to work together to build their young country, using the foundations of older generations who formally secured their independence from Indonesia in 2002, to grow in peace, prosperity and reconciliation.

“Go forward with the happiness of youth, but don’t forget one thing,” Francis told them. “You are the heirs of those who persevered in founding this nation. For this, don’t lose your memory, the memory of those who persevered with so much sacrifice to consolidate this nation.”

The 87-year-old pope, who is on the longest and furthest trip of his pontificate, ditched his prepared remarks to speak off the cuff in his native Spanish, as he often does when he is around young people.

The joyous encounter came just hours after around 600,000 people – or nearly half the population – packed a seaside park for Francis’ Mass. It was held on the same field where St John Paul II prayed 35 years ago, when East Timor was under brutally oppressive Indonesian rule.

Francis came to East Timor, also known as Timor-Leste, to encourage it more than two decades after it secured independence as it struggles with poverty and high unemployment.

In his final remarks at the end of the liturgy, Francis warned the Timorese today to beware of the “crocodiles” who come ashore and “want to change your culture, your history”.

It was an apparent reference both to East Timor’s past, as a colonial possession of first Portugal and then Indonesia, but also its current attractiveness to international commercial interests eager to develop its natural gas reserves.

The oil and gas industry is the bedrock of the Timorese economy and the main source of government revenue.

Development of the promising offshore Greater Sunrise gas field, shared between Australia and East Timor, has been stalled for more than two decades – mainly over the question of which country the fuel should be piped to.

Timorese officials believe that piping gas into their country would deliver more benefits for their people despite the added logistical challenges. In an interview last week, President Jose Ramos-Horta said any alternative would have to be “a very persuasive proposal”.

Francis, who is from Argentina and is history’s first Latin American pope, has long railed against multinational companies that exploit poor countries for their natural resources for their own benefit without taking care to adequately compensate the local population or care for the environment.

“And don’t go near those crocodiles because they bite, and bite a lot, a lot,” Francis said on Tuesday night, using a term in Spanish that means both “to bite” and to accept bribes.

The huge turnout in East Timor was a testament to the devout Catholic faith of its people and their reverence of the church, which strongly backed the Timorese’ fight for independence. Francis praised the Timorese for having not only built up their country from scratch, but reconciled with Indonesia after securing independence in 2002.

Francis’s tour will end in Singapore, one of Asia’s economic powerhouses. The city-state’s transformation from a colonial port lacking natural resources into an economic power since its independence from Malaysia in 1965 has long been touted as a success story.

It enjoys one of the highest living standards in the world, and is known for its safety and low crime rate.

But it is also one of the most expensive cities to live in and its competitive work environment makes for a stressful, overworked people.

Francis has no official program in Singapore on Wednesday other than a private meeting with his Jesuit confreres.