Pope delivers Christmas blessing after fall

Pope Benedict XVI delivered his traditional Christmas Day blessing today, looking tired and unsteady but otherwise fine hours after being knocked down by a woman who jumped the barrier at the start of Mass in St.Peter's Basilica.

The Vatican said the 82-year-old Benedict was unhurt in the fall and that his busy Christmas schedule would remain unchanged.

French Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, an 87-year-old Vatican diplomat, fractured his hip in the commotion and will be operated on at Rome's Gemelli hospital, Vatican spokesman the Rev Federico Lombardi said.

Benedict appeared a bit unsteady as he approached his chair on the loggia overlooking St. Peter's Square to deliver his traditional Christmas blessing and was steadied by an attendant.

But he then spread open his arms, blessed the crowd and delivered his "Urbi et Orbi"speech, Latin for "To the city and the world," without any problem. He followed with Christmas greetings in 65 different languages that drew sustained cheers and chants from the crowd.

In the speech, the pope decried the effects of the world financial crisis, conflicts in the Holy Land and Africa, and the plight of the "tiny flock" of Christians in Iraq.

"At times it is subject to violence and injustice, but it remains determined to make its own contribution to the building of a society opposed to the logic of conflict and the rejection of one's neighbour," he said.