Pictures show the Pope turning slightly behind him to speak to the Italian Army and telling them to take their masks off. 

Once the masks had been removed the group then faced forward and had their pictures taken during a meeting at the Vatican.   

The officers had arrived at the Vatican for the Pope's weekly general audience at the Paul VI Hall on Wednesday.   

It comes after the Pope was criticised back in 2020 for rarely wearing a face mask and only wearing one for the first time in October - seven months after the coronavirus outbreak. 

Previously he wore masks only in a car taking him to his weekly audiences in the Vatican. 

The pope took off his mask while he read his address, as did other leaders when they spoke, but put it back on when he finished speaking. 

During the Wednesday audience Pope Francis asked people around the world to remember Ukrainians in underground shelters seeking protection from bombardments and thanked Poland for taking in the bulk of refugees from the war.

Francis spoke at his weekly general audience on Ash Wednesday, which he has declared a day of prayer and fasting for peace in Ukraine.

After addressing Poles, the pope went off script to say that the Polish translator on the stage with him, Father Marek Viktor Gongalo, is Ukrainian.

'His parents are now in underground shelters to protect themselves from the bombs in a place near Kyiv,' the pope said.