VATICAN CITY
The Republic

By NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press
February 06, 2013

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican’s new sex crimes prosecutor has insisted on the need for transparency about the church’s failures to protect children from sex abuse by priests.

In his first public comments since taking office, the Rev. Robert Oliver quoted Pope Benedict XVI in saying the church must recognize the “grave errors in judgment that were often committed by the church’s leadership.” For decades, bishops around the globe actively covered up abuse by priests in their care, while Vatican officials in Rome often turned a blind eye.

Oliver, previously a canon lawyer in the Boston archdiocese — ground zero of the U.S. abuse scandal — spoke days after thousands of pages of personnel files of abusive priests were released by court order in Los Angeles. They showed how retired Cardinal Roger Mahony and other top…