In recent years, the Holy See has repeatedly been criticized in the world for inadequate response to numerous cases of pedophilia by priests and monks.

Representatives of public organizations directly accused the former Pope Benedict XVI and the Roman Curia prominent representatives in an attempt to silence these crimes and prevent their investigation. According to media reports, the former pontiff in 2011 and 2012 disfrocked nearly 400 priests suspected in pedophilia.

According to the newspaper, the official representatives of the city-state first went before the committee after the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment convention was signed by Vatican in 2002. According to human rights defenders, an investigation may be initiated.

The Committee stated that sexual abuse is torture, based on the fact that it may cause physical and moral harm, lawyer Pam Spees said to the newspaper. This may let the courts consider the cases of abuse by priests as torture.

In its turn, the Vatican 's permanent representative in Geneva Archbishop Silvano Tomasi said that the Vatican had signed the UN Convention on the assumption that it applies only to the territory of the Vatican, not the Catholic priests and bishops around the world.

Papal commission on sex abuse to push for accountability

A commission advising Pope Francis on the sexual abuse crisis will recommend that negligent clerics be held accountable regardless of their rank in the Church, Boston's Cardinal Sean O'Malley said on Saturday. In many cases of abuse, most of which took place decades ago but surfaced in the past 15 years, bishops seeking to protect the Church's reputation moved priests from parish to parish instead of defrocking them or handing them over to police.

The commission, made up of four men and four women from eight countries including an Irish woman who was a victim of abuse, met for the first time since its formation in March, holding talks with the pope and Vatican officials.

"We see ensuring accountability in the Church as especially important," the commission said in a statement, Reuters reports.

Victims' groups have pressed the Vatican to hold bishops who either shielded abusers or were negligent in protecting children to account, along with abusers themselves.

The commission, which includes Baroness Sheila Hollins of Britain, will draw up protocols for the pope to consider.

Procedures to protect children and punish abusers are most advanced in countries such as the United States and Ireland.

Last month, Pope Francis sought forgiveness for the "evil" committed by priests who molested children.

In February, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child accused the Vatican of systematically turning a blind eye to decades of abuse and attempting to cover up sex crimes. The Vatican called the report unfair and ideologically slanted.

Pope personally asks forgiveness for child sex abuse by priests

Pope Francis on Friday personally asked forgiveness for child sex abuse by priests - the first time he has made such an apology since being elected last year.

"I feel compelled... to personally ask for forgiveness for the damage they have done for having sexually abused children," the pope said at a meeting with members of a children's charity, Vatican Radio reported. Francis said the number of guilty priests was "quite a few in number" but "obviously not compared to the number of all the priests".

"The Church is aware of this damage," he said.

"It is personal, moral damage carried out by men of the Church and we will not take one step backward with regards to how we will deal with this problem and the sanctions that must be imposed," he added.

Francis was meeting with members of International Catholic Child Bureau, which works to protect the rights and dignity of children worldwide.

Thousands of cases of abuse by priests have come to light over the past decade and the Catholic Church is regularly accused of trying to cover up the crimes.

But the Vatican has vowed a zero-tolerance approach and has begun implementing prevention and detection measures to root out abuse, although this varies widely between different countries.

Francis's predecessor Benedict XVI had also made a personal apology for the abuses.