GENEVA
RT
The UN Human Rights Committee has blamed the Vatican for indulging longstanding policies enabling priests to sexually abuse children, and called to open pedophile files and disclose the names of those clergymen who assisted in concealing such crimes.
A scathing UN report published on Wednesday accuses the Holy See of a systematic blackout concerning the molestation of children, claiming that tens of thousands of children have been raped by priests.
“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 and the impunity of the perpetrators,” said the report.
The UN Committee recommended the Holy See to implement the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child properly. It is the world’s most important international treaty protecting children’s rights. The UN also called for suspected clerics to be handed over to the police.
The report accuses the Catholic Church of putting the organization’s reputation ahead of the duty to protect children and ensure their access to health care.
The report followed a harsh interrogation in January of two high-ranking Catholic clerics on known cases of child sex abuse by clergy. Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Holy See’s representative to the United Nations in Geneva, and Bishop Charles Scicluna, the Vatican’s former chief prosecutor of sex abuse cases, were interrogated by an 18-member committee for many hours.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.