“I think of that poor girl blown up by a bomb under her car seat in Moscow,” Pope Francis said on August 24, in reference to the murder of Darya Dugina, an advocate of the Russian invasion who had denied that Russian soldiers have committed war crimes.

The Ukrainian ambassador to the Holy See described the Pope’s remarks as “disappointing.” Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry has now summoned the apostolic nuncio to express formal disapproval.

“I will say frankly that the Ukrainian heart was broken by the Pope’s words,” said Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs.