BishopAccountability.org
	Swiss President Calls for Blacklist of 'Paedophile' Priests Expatica March 28, 2010 http://www.expatica.com/ch/news/swiss-rss-news/swiss-president-calls-for-blacklist-of-paedophile-priests_33868.html SWITZERLAND -- Swiss President Doris Leuthard called in remarks published Sunday for paedophile priests to be put on a blacklist to ensure they have no contact with children. "It is important that paedophiles, whether they are priests, teachers or if they have one form or other dealings with children, should no longer be able to have contact with children," she said on the website of Swiss newspaper Le Matin Dimanche. "Maintaining a centralised register as it currently exists for teachers should also be discussed for paedophile priests," she said. Leuthard said help centres should be set up for victims and the abuse taken up by the courts. "And the cases should be treated resolutely. There, the church has to take up its share of responsibility. "Whether the perpetrators are non-religious or religious makes no difference. All must be subjected to the Swiss penal code, without exception," she stressed. Leuthard's comments came a week after a leading Swiss priest called on the Vatican to set up an international register of Roman Catholic clergy who have been reported for sex abuse. Martin Werlen, a member of the Swiss Bishops Conference, had said he feared the Catholic hierarchy had failed to take the impact of the latest child sex abuse scandals in Ireland and elsewhere seriously enough. Werlen told the Sonntagsblick newspaper that an official Swiss church body that deals with sex abuse had discussed the idea of "a central office in Rome, which would register church people who have been reported." Allegations of sexual molestation by priests have piled up across Europe after episodes of child abuse were exposed in Ireland. In Switzerland the church said last Saturday that it was examining at least nine "serious" cases of suspected sexual abuse or harassment in recent years. Pope Benedict XVI is also under mounting criticism after a New York Times report Friday said that he had failed in 1980 to stop a priest accused of sexually abusing children.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.