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Pope Francis made his first international apostolic visit in 15 months after accepting the invitation of the Republic of Iraq and the local Catholic Church to visit the Middle Eastern country of Iraq from 5–8 March 2021. Pope Francis visited Baghdad, the plain of Ur, linked to the memory of Abraham, the city of Erbil, as well as Mosul and Qaraqosh in the plain of Nineveh. Among those Pope Francis met with during his Iraq visit was top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who the Pope visited in Najaf and with whom he issued a joint statement denouncing extremism. 
Pope Francis visited Budapest, Hungary on the occasion of the closing Mass for the 52nd Eucharistic Congress. He also visited Slovakia for 4 days from September 12 to September 15. Pope Francis traveled to Cyprus and Greece on 2–6 December. The four-day trip to the two Mediterranean countries included stops in Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, Athens, the Greek capital, and the Greek island of Lesbos. 
The Vatican issued a €1,25 miniature sheet to acknowledge the Pope's travels in 2021.The bottom of the miniature sheet features the Pope and the Ziggurat of the Plain of Ur, a place of great symbolic significance for its reference to the figure of Abraham and thus to the beginnings of God’s covenant with him, and where the inter-religious meeting took place. In the center is a reminder of the visit made by the Holy Father to the “Reception and Identification Centre” in Mytilene on the island of Lesbos, represented by his embrace with a refugee leaning out from a boat that brought him to safety. Above the refugee lies the body of the dead Christ, held by his Mother of Sorrows, venerated in Šaštín, Slovakia, as Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows.

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