Sunday, July 01, 2012

Sri Lanka's hidden scourge of religious child abuse...

Pahalagama Somaratana Thera is one of the few Sri Lankan Buddhist monks to have been found guilty of child abuse inside or outside the country.

But if Children's Affairs Minister Tissa Karaliyadda is to be believed, child abuse in religious establishments by both Buddhist and Christian clergy in Sri Lanka is rampant.

Yet according to figures from Sri Lanka's National Child Protection Authority (NCPA), only three Buddhist monks have been convicted of child abuse in Sri Lanka in recent history.

One of those died from poison he drank after he was sentenced for raping a girl aged 13 in 2005.

Research carried out by the BBC Sinhala service has revealed that over the last decade, nearly 110 Buddhist monks have been charged for sexual and physical assaults on minors in Sri Lanka.

Many of these cases - especially those of a sexual nature - were barely reported by the Sri Lankan media and seldom resulted in convictions. Full story...

Related posts:
  1. "Shocking incidents" of child abuse in Sri Lanka...
  2. Monk in Sri Lanka severly tortures Catholic teen for refusing to...
  3. Sexual abuse fears loom large as Sri Lanka activists oppose plan to train boys...
  4. Catholic Church gets ultimatum over child abuse inaction...
  5. Ultra-orthodox Jews in New York shun their own for reporting child sex abuse...

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