Matteo Bruni, director of the press office, did not mention whether the pope's planned trip to Canada in late July was still set.

"At the request of his doctors, and in order not to jeopardise the results of the therapy that he is undergoing for his knee, the Holy Father has been forced to postpone, with regret, his apostolic journey to the Democratic Republic of Congo and to South Sudan," Bruni said on June 10.

The trip would be moved "to a later date to be determined."

Although Pope Francis has cancelled several events since mid-January and has begun using a wheelchair or a cane, the Vatican had continued to insist that he would make the two trips in July.

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