AUSTRALIA
Reuters
SYDNEY | BY JANE WARDELL AND TOM WESTBROOK
Cardinal George Pell, the Australian-born Vatican treasurer, is being investigated in relation to multiple allegations of child abuse in his home country, Victoria state police said.
Victoria state Police Commissioner Graham Ashton said on a Melbourne radio station program on Thursday that Victoria police had been investigating allegations against Pell for more than a year.
“The investigation is ongoing,” Ashton told Radio 3AW, confirming an Australian Broadcasting Television report on Wednesday that detailed allegations of abuse dating from the 1970s to the 1990s in interviews with alleged victims.
In a statement issued in Rome on Wednesday, Pell’s office said he “refutes all the allegations made on the program”.
ABC said it has obtained eight police statements from complainants, witnesses and family members who were helping with the investigation. The broadcaster said it received no information from police for its story.
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