GENEVA
Aljazeera
The UN has rejected the Vatican’s argument that it can not implement a children’s rights convention beyond its walls, saying the church has “placed the reputation of the church and the protection of the perpetrators above children’s interests.”
The Vatican was denounced on Wednesday by a UN human rights committee for adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children, and that these practices also allowed the abuse to continue once detected.
There was not, the committee said, adequate provision to ensure cases like Ireland’s Magdalene laundries scandal, where girls were arbitrarily placed in conditions of forced labour could not be repeated.
Offenders are moved around to new churches or locations, in order to protect them, while putting more children at risk of abuse, the report said while also condemning the “code of silence” imposed on child victims and the fact that those exposed almost always avoided prosecution.
“The Committee is gravely concerned that the Holy See has not acknowledged the extent of the crimes committed, has not taken the necessary measures to address cases of child sexual abuse and to protect children, and has adopted policies and practices which have led to the continuation of the abuse by and the impunity of the perpetrators,” the report said.
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