Horrific scale of abuse makes headlines in world press

THE horrific scale of the abuse carried out against children made headlines around the world.

Major media organisations carried news of the findings of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse and, in some countries, there were calls for similar investigations into alleged abuses there.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported how the report into “endemic” child abuse in church institutions in Ireland has sparked fresh calls for a royal commission into historical child abuse in Australia.

“Victims’ groups say the culture of abuse in Catholic institutions here last century could have been as shocking as what is revealed in a nine-year Irish commission’s report, and that as many as one in 10 priests, brothers and nuns could have a case to answer for sexual, emotional or physical abuse.”

It added that 12 of the 1,090 witnesses interviewed for the report now live in Australia and New Zealand, amid estimates that 4% of Irish victims moved there, along with “an unknown number of alleged perpetrators”.

Time.com reported: “As well as documenting the most depraved acts committed by school staff, Justice Sean Ryan’s report condemns the culture of secrecy that prevailed in the institutions. Incidents of child abuse committed by members of religious orders were almost never reported to the police. Furthermore, priests who were known abusers were often transferred to other institutions where they continued to abuse children.”

The Toronto Star reported how “Irish children ‘lived with terror’”, while the New York Times carried the views of victims’ groups in America.

“David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, a group based in St Louis, said that, while the report had failed in its duty to bring the perpetrators to justice, it had been clear about the failings of the church,” said the paper.

“Terence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org, an American group that maintains an internet archive of material related to Catholic abuse, said that the report had failed by not going far enough.”

In France, Le Monde noted how after five volumes, 2,600 pages, and nine years of inquiry, there was one definitive result: that priests and monks beat and raped children in 216 Catholic institutions.

In Germany, newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung carried a report on the findings under the easy-to-translate headline: ‘Häuser des Horrors’.