ANKARA — Pope Leo lamented during his first trip outside Italy as Catholic leader on Thursday that the world was seeing an unusual number of bloody conflicts, and warned that a third world war was being “fought piecemeal” with humanity’s future at risk.

In his first speech given overseas since his election in May to lead the 1.4 billion-member Church, Leo, the first U.S. pope, said “ambitions and choices that trample on justice and peace” were destabilising the world.

He told political leaders in Turkey that the world was experiencing “a heightened level of conflict on the global level, fuelled by prevailing strategies of economic and military power”.

“We must in no way give in to this,” he pleaded at an event with President Tayyip Erdogan after they held a private meeting. “The future

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