Francis to resume general audiences after July break

Pope Francis will on Wednesday resume his general audience in St Peter's Square after the traditional weekly encounters with pilgrims were suspended for the month of July.

Francis went on a five-day trip to southern Poland last month where he attended the World Youth Day with 1.5 million young pilgrims in Krakow and visited the former World War II German Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Unlike his predecessors, Francis does not go to the papal summer residence of Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome, or to the Alps, preferring remain at the Vatican in July and August when he is not travelling.