UN Committee Against Torture to Review the Vatican

Prensa Latina
April 28, 2014

http://www.plenglish.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2625411&Itemid=1

United Nations, Apr 28 (Prensa Latina) Next month the United Nations Committee against Torture will review the Vatican for the first time, in public sessions that will include talks with delegations with the Holy See and civil society, said today the United Nations from its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. According to the committee, created by the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1984 and open to signing, ratification and joining, the review will take place on May 5th and 6th and conclusions will be issued 17 days later.

The Holy See is one of the 155 States that signed the Convention, which came into effect in 1987, and therefore must be subjected to regular probes on its situation, said in a press release the Committee, made up of 10 independent experts.

Along with the Vatican, countries like Guinea, Cyprus, Lithuania, Montenegro, Sierra Leone, Thailand and Uruguay will be reviewed.

The review will take place three months after that the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) urged the Holy See to implement more actions to fight child abuse carried out by the clergy, as well as removal and denunciation of perpetrators.

In a report, the CRC criticized the Catholic Church for having implemented policies and actions that favored such crimes as well as keeping perpetrators anonymous.

The website for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights published a report issued by the Holy See, following requirements of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment, to which it joined in June 2002 on behalf of the State of the Vatican.

According to the document, Popes Paul VI, John Paul II and Benedict XVI repeatedly showed their opposition to torture.