What was supposed to be a gesture of courtesy and institutional respect—the Pope’s greeting to the mayor of Lima, Rafael López Aliaga—has turned into a new chapter of political and diplomatic maneuvers orchestrated from the entourage of President Dina Boluarte and media outlets aligned with Gustavo Gorriti.
According to exclusive confirmation from InfoVaticana, Aliaga, mayor of one of the largest cities in America and a political figure of continental stature, has canceled his participation in the Pope’s General Audience and has urgently returned to America, frustrating an operation designed to expose him to international public opinion, carefully planned by the Gorriti, Ugaz, Salinas group…
A carefully designed diplomatic ambush
The trap consisted of the following: having Aliaga present at the General Audience on September 17—with passes already confirmed by the Prefecture of the Pontifical Household—, seating him with his delegation, and then having other representatives, carefully selected by the Peruvian embassy and aligned with the officialdom, go up to greet the Pope, leaving the mayor out, thus simulating an alleged pontifical snub.
The objective was clear: to erode Aliaga’s image as a political leader, and to present to the international press the narrative that the Holy Father would have publicly ignored him.
But the Lima mayor did not fall into the trap.
A diplomatic verbal note dated September 16, to which this medium has had access, informs that Rafael López Aliaga will not participate in the audience with the Pope.
The Mayor advanced his trip to Washington to attend the hearing of the trial of the Municipality of Lima against corrupt Odebrecht and its fraudulently obtained tolls in Lima.
The document also details that he was carrying two symbolic gifts—the keys to the city of Lima and an Andean “Varayoc”—which he planned to deliver personally to His Holiness.
Hours after the official communication, the mayor took flight. According to his airline ticket, also included in the documentation reviewed by InfoVaticana, he departed on the same day 17 at 10:20 a.m. from Rome to Miami, abruptly interrupting his agenda in Europe.
A gesture that speaks for itself
Lima is not a minor city. It is one of the main cities in America, with more than 13 million inhabitants, and the Pope has received in his office personalities from all over the world, many of them with much less notoriety than him.
The gifts that Aliaga was carrying to the Holy Father now remain in the hands of the Embassy of Peru in Italy, awaiting delivery in a future dignified audience without manipulation.