Leaders arrive for funeral

WORLD leaders will attend the funeral of Pope Francis today.

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Some 150,000 people have passed by Francis’s coffin as he lay in state over the past three days in St Peter’s Basilica.

Irish President Michael D Higgins was among those to pay his respects yesterday, ahead of his attendance at today’s requiem mass. He will join his nation's premier Micheal Martin, UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, the Prince of Wales - who is attending on behalf of the King - US President Donald Trump and a vast array of other leaders and dignitaries.

The leader of Catholics in England and Wales, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, has predicted the funeral will be a “masterpiece” in stage-managing “big egos”.