VATICAN: 848 PRIESTS DEFROCKED FOR CHILD ABUSE

Geneva, 8 Rajab 1435/7 May 2014 (MINA) – The Vatican disclosed on Tuesday the number of priests defrocked and punished for sexual abuse of children over the last decade, saying 848 priests were defrocked and another 2,572 were given lesser sanctions.

Arch bishop Silvano Tomasi, the Vatican’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, revealed the figures for the first time, and said a total of 3,400 incidents of abuse have been recorded since 2004, 401 of which were reported in 2013.

In February, the United Nations’ Committee on the Rights of the Child urged the Holy See to ensure the immediate removal of all priests suspected of being connected to child abuse and other crimes against children.

Tomasi said priests who were found to have committed lesser abuses were nonetheless placed in positions where they would not have any contact with children, Anadolu Agency quoted by Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA) as reporting.

The United Nations Committee Against Torture inquired about a report by the Holy See regarding compliance with the Convention Against Torture. The Vatican told the UN committee that the Catholic Church still needs to “clean house” and repair the damage done by priests carrying out child abuse.

The UN committee will release its final observations on May 23.

Previously, victim groups have demanded that abuse by Catholic clerics be recognized as torture, as Vatican officials are grilled by a UN committee, Press TV report.

The appeal was made by victims and their lawyers on Monday in New York. They argued that even though the Vatican is a signatory to the 1987 UN Convention on Torture, it has violated torture agreements.

“There is a body of national and international law in which rape and sexual abuse has been recognized as a form of torture and cruel and degrading treatment,” said Pam Spees, a lawyer at the Centre for Constitutional Rights (CRC) in New York. (T/P09/p04).

Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)