Amnesty International, the world’s largest human rights organization, has charged the Vatican and the Catholic Church with human rights violations for failing to protect children from abuse and for failure to comply with international mandates to protect children.
In an annual report released Friday Amnesty International cites the Vatican and the Catholic Church for the following human rights abuses: failure to remove clergy perpetrators from their posts, refusing to cooperate with judicial authorities, and abdicating responsibility for reparations to the victims of clergy abuse.
According to the report:
The Holy See did not sufficiently comply with its international obligations relating to the protection of children.
Canon law does not include an obligation for church authorities to report cases to civil authorities for criminal investigation. Secrecy is mandatory throughout the proceedings.
In addition, the report refers to:
The enduring failure of the Catholic Church to properly address crimes of child sexual abuse committed by members of the clergy over the past decades.
The Vatican shares space in the report with such infamous human rights violators as China, Libya and Nigeria.
The Amnesty report documents torture and other ill-treatment in at least 98 countries, specific restrictions on free speech in at least 89 countries, reports on unfair trials in at least 54 countries and highlights cases of prisoners of conscience in at least 48 countries.
Catholic League President Bill Donohue called the charges made against the Vatican in Amnesty's 2011 Annual Report "preposterous," and argued that the report "is ideology at work, not objective research."
The following is a sample of recent tweets from the relevant Twitter stream:
Vatican still getting away with the cover-up of systemic abuse of children Amnesty calls Vatican human rights abusers.
Absolutely nothing in the @Amnesty report mentions the steps taken by the Vatican, & by local Catholic Church, to deal with this issue.
What does the #Vatican have in common with China, Lybia and Nigeria? Amnesty International says they're all human rights violators.
Secularists welcome Amnesty naming Vatican over child abuse
About time! Amnesty International's 2011 human rights violations report lists Vatican for failure to protect children
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