Pope Leo has issued a stark condemnation of companies prioritising “dizzying” profits over environmental protection, during a visit to a region of Italy notorious for illegal toxic waste dumping.
On Saturday, the first US pontiff travelled to Acerra, approximately 220 kilometres south of Rome, urging the world to “reject temptations of power and enrichment linked to practices that pollute the land, water, air, and social coexistence.”
The area, near Naples, is grimly known as the “Land of Fires,” where the European Court of Human Rights ruled last year that authorities had failed to safeguard residents from waste dumping since at least 1988. Pope Leo stated his desire to visit to “gather the tears” of families who have lost loved ones to related illnesses.
Arriving by popemobile to an outdoor square on a sunny spring day, Pope Leo was greeted by crowds waving small yellow and white Vatican flags and wearing yellow hats, some holding posters of deceased family members.
Pope Leo, who has adopted a more forceful tone in recent months and is set to issue his first major document on Monday, declared that “unscrupulous people and organizations have been allowed to act with impunity for too long.” During his four-hour visit to Acerra, he also criticised “the dizzying profits of a few, blind to the needs of people, their work and their future,” and met with victims.
For years, waste collection, treatment, and disposal in southern Italy were largely controlled by a small group of private entities, with contracts sometimes linked to the Camorra, a Naples-based mafia group.
In January 2025, the European court found that Italian authorities had repeatedly failed to halt illegal dumping in a region also dubbed the “Triangle of Death” due to abnormally high cancer rates among local residents. The court granted the Italian government two years to establish a comprehensive database of toxic waste sites and communicate the risks to the public.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni responded in February 2025 by appointing an Italian general to lead a task force aimed at assisting victims and overseeing environmental clean-up efforts.
Pope Leo’s first encyclical, a significant text for the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics, is expected on Monday. It is anticipated to address the rise of artificial intelligence and its implications for warfare and workers’ rights.
