GERMANY
Spiegel

The German Catholic Church called off an independent review of allegations of sexual abuse in its ranks this week. The head of the investigation accused the Church of censorship. On Thursday, the two sides traded blame as German commentators largely mourned the end of the examination.

Representatives of the German Catholic Church and independent investigators traded blame Thursday after an agreement to have an independent examination of sexual abuse in the Church broke down earlier this week.

The Church’s Bishops’ Conference called off the investigation — agreed to in 2011 after a nationwide abuse scandal the year before — citing a lack of trust with the investigators. The Lower Saxony Criminological Research Institute (KFN) had been tasked with investigating personnel files from churches in all of the country’s 27 dioceses, to look for and examine cases of abuse.

But the Bishops’ Conference was allegedly unable to agree…