UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
For immediate release: Friday, May 23, 2014
Statement by Mary Caplan of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 917 439 4187, mcaplan682@aol.com )
Here is the bottom line in the new UN committee report which severely criticizes the Vatican.
Ever so gradually, brave victims and secular authorities are putting an end to centuries of impunity, immunity, and selfishness by Catholic officials in rampant and devastating cases of clergy sexual violence and cover ups.
An independent group of experts has concluded that the Vatican has not done its duty to prevent, punish and redress torture and ill treatment – because of how Catholic officials enable clergy sexual violence against kids and their refusal to stop and punish it.
As Reuters reports, the UN panel “rejected the Vatican’s position that the Holy See has jurisdiction only in the tiny Vatican City State.” Pope Francis should be ashamed that his top aides made and still make this transparently self-serving claim.
(In a news conference today, Committee chair Claudio Grossman said that it is a “settled thing in international law” as “old as bread and butter” that “the violation of the convention is not exclusively related to things that happen in your own territory” but extends to actions under a country’s jurisdiction or “effective control.”)
And as the Associated Press reports “the panel’s 10 independent experts. . .referred to rape and sexual violence, which clearly falls within the treaty’s mandate” and “Vatican officials failed to report abuse charges properly, moved priests rather than discipline them. . .”
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