VATICAN CITY, June 5 (Reuters) - Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, tasked by Pope Francis to carry out a peace mission to try to help end the war in Ukraine, will visit Kyiv on Monday and Tuesday, the Vatican said in a statement.

"This is an initiative whose main purpose is to listen in depth to the Ukrainian authorities on the possible ways to reach a just peace and support gestures of humanity that may help ease tensions," it said.

Since the war started in February 2022, Francis and the Vatican have tried to offer themselves as a possible peace brokers, but to date, their efforts have not been successful.

Zuppi hails from the Sant' Egidio Community, a Rome-based peace and justice group, which in 1992 brokered a deal that ended the civil war in Mozambique that had killed about a million people and displaced about four million.

The pope made him a cardinal in 2019 and he was elected head of the Italian Episcopal Conference last year.