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Saturday, July 31 2010 @ 05:31 PM EST

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Fighting for their identity

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Canada’s past is catching up with it as the native children who were brought up in residential schools seek accountability

IT WAS snowing the day that Michael Cachagee and his two brothers left home. Their mother took the boys by horse-drawn sleigh to the Indian agent’s office. Before surrendering her children, she told them they were going to a nice place where they would have lots of fun.
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State Cover Up of Child Abuse?

Institutational Abuseflag_usa Tag: usa

Disturbing' secret manual reveals brutal methods used on youths held in child prisons

A government manual instructing prison staff on how to inflict pain on teenage inmates was today labelled 'state authorised child abuse'.
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Residential school abuses: 'Trauma and loss' exposed

Institutational Abuseflag_canada Tag: canada

By Ethan Baron, The Province

Thousands who lost their aboriginal identity, their family and even their childhood get to tell their stories to Canadians at a national gathering that starts today.

WARNING TO RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL SURVIVORS: This story contains material that may trigger a traumatic reaction for survivors of residential school abuse.

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Indian layman arrested for child abuse

Institutational Abuse flag_India Tag: india

Police in Kerala have arrested a Catholic layman and charged him with sexually abusing boys in the orphanage that he runs.

Antony Thareparambil was arrested on June 15 after seven residents of Kriaplayam (house of grace) Orphanage complained about him, said B. Sandya, a police official.
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Boy, 11, slams residential schools legacy

Institutational Abuseflag_canada Tag: canada

An 11-year-old boy stole the spotlight at the opening day of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings into the tragedy of Canada's residential schools.
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Parents say bullying led to suicide of daughter, 11

Institutational Abuseflag_usa Tag: usa

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. - The family of a 11-year-old Catholic school student who committed suicide said the girl suffered from years of bullying.

Celina Rebecca Okwuone hanged herself in her closet May 20, Port St. Lucie police said. Investigators said they found no indication she was under "above-average pressure" for a child of her age. Her parents disagreed in a statement released Thursday.
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Institutions failed to put safety of children first

Institutational Abuseflag_usa Tag: usa

It's difficult to find many things in life that everyone can agree on. One of those rare topics of consensus is sexual abuse of children.

It is taboo in every culture, and those who perpetrate it are universally loathed.

So why is it that so many large institutions have historically felt the need to protect the abusers, rather than the abused?

The top offenders in this unforgivable practice of cover-up are as obvious as the recent headlines: the Roman Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts, school districts.
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Mounting cases of abuse in former East German children's homes

Institutational Abuse

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Leipzig - At least 30 cases of abuse have been recorded at a former East German centre for delinquent children, the head of a memorial centre for the children's home said on Saturday.

More and more people were coming forward with tales of abuse during their time at Torgau youth detention centre in former East Germany, according to Gabriele Beyler, who heads a memorial centre documenting the closed institution.
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Pope's German Ally Is Accused of Beating Orphans

Institutational Abuse

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Pope Benedict XVI's already tarnished reputation took another hit Wednesday after one of his closest conservative allies in Germany was accused of savagely beating and flogging children in his care some 30 years ago.
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Child abuse reported at East German institutions

Institutational Abuse

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As the sex abuse scandal within Germanys Catholic Church continues to unfold, former charges at East German childrens homes have come forward to allege there was also widespread abuse in the communist country's state-run institutions.

Head of a memorial foundation to the Torgau youth disciplinary centre Gabriele Beyler told daily Der Tagesspiegel that some 25 former home occupants claim supervisors there took part in massive abuse.
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Church and State equally to blame

Institutational Abuse

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The most consistent charge put to Catholic Church authority figures is why didn't they bring child abuse allegations to the State's attention.

The stark reality is that the State would have been as utterly incompetent, and perhaps as collusive, as the church has proven to have been.

This is the cold, ugly truth of our immature society.
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Truth commission seeks other side of the story

Institutational Abuse

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THE commission tasked with exposing the truth and healing the wounds of the Indian residential school system is looking for the other side of the story.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, headed by Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench Justice Murray Sinclair, is putting out a call to teachers and school staff members who may have worked at any of the 137-plus residential schools scattered around the country.
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103 children sent abroad by Catholic agencies in North, minister reveals

Institutational Abuse

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More than 100 children were taken from their families in the North by Catholic agencies to former British colonies, the health minister said today.

Last month British Prime Minister Gordon Brown expressed regret for the misguided Child Migrant Programme, telling the House of Commons he was truly sorry. He also announced a 6m (6.6m) fund to reunite families that were torn apart.
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AMERICAN INDIANS AND AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINES TRAVEL A SIMILAR PATH

Institutational Abuse

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By Tim Giago (Nanwica Kciji)

There is a colonization connection the indigenous people of Australia
and America share.

Both were driven to the brink of annihilation by invaders. Both had
their children ripped from their arms and placed into institutional
boarding schools intent upon acculturation by whatever means (See the
movie Rabbit Proof Fence).
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British orphans: 'It broke our hearts to see them go away'

Institutational Abuse

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Thousands of British orphans sent to Australia faced a life of violence, rape and virtual slavery. But what of the children left in the UK? Lynne Wallis reports

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Why we arent bothered

Institutational Abuse

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Are we, as Phil Garland, HSE assistant national director for children and families, suggested, simply racist? I can only imagine the resources that would be marshalled and the blanket media coverage if Irish children whom I teach went missing. Between 2000 and 2009 a total of 501 migrant children went missing from HSE care. Only 67 have been successfully traced.

How is it that hundreds of children disappear from the states care, and almost no-one takes any notice? Does this simply boil down to racism or some variation of it? Or is it something else; the outworking of the same phenomenon that makes the death of a few individuals in The United States or Western Europe considerably more news worthy than the deaths of scores of poor rural Asians or Africans? The outworking of an accepted, albeit rarely acknowledged human life value index? The same index which confers some missing children and their families near celebrity status while leaving others in their anonymity?
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An apology for the Home Children

Institutational Abuse

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By Robert Sibley and Louisa Taylor, The Ottawa Citizen; with files from the Montreal Gazette.

OTTAWA Norah Dennis is "proud" that the British prime minister is apologizing for a policy that saw thousands of children shipped to Britain's colonies in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

"It's long overdue," says Dennis, a Seattle, Washington artist and a descendent of a home child sent to

Ottawa more than a century ago. "I just hope he's apologizing to all of the children, not just to the living."
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Child migrant recalls his 'stolen life'

Institutational Abuse

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By Alison Holt BBC News

It is a cold, snowy morning when I meet Rex Wade at his house in Cornwall.

He is padding about in his flip-flops. He puts it down to the years spent growing up in Australia.

He is probably one of the last children sent half way round the world from Britain to Australia.
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Clerical Abuse: The Institutional Responsibility

Institutational Abuse

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A comment in response to my post on Pope Benedicts meeting with the Irish Bishops (Clerical Abuse:Vatican Blame Game, Revisited) queried my claims that part of the blame lies deeply embedded in the rules, institutions and culture of the Church itself. The same comment also raised a perception of disproportionate treatment on this site of matters of Vatican theology, and Vatican adminstration.

That issue I will return to later. However, the question of the churchs institutional responsibility for the abuse problems world wide, including abuse of adults as well as children, is one I have investigated and explored at length at my home site, Queering the Church. I have previously promised to summarise those arguments here, but have not yet done so. Accordingly, I felt obliged to respond to Davids comments at some length.
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Redress backlash hits State

Institutational Abuse

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The Western Australian Government has decided to compensate survivors who suffered physical and sexual abuse after they were shipped out to Australia from Britain after the war. Most of them ended up in residential institutions run by non governmental organisations including the Catholic Church.

However the compensation payments are miserly. The Irish compensation scale ranges from 50,000 to 300,000 with the average payment being 67,000. The Australian compensation scale ranges from 3920 to 29610.

The maximum payment under the Australian scheme is less than half the average payment made to Irish survivors. The State Government is paying the bill. None of the non governmental organisations that received the child migrants is paying a penny.
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Carnival of Anarchy

Institutational Abuse

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Kevin Annett, human rights activist beaten in Vancouver on Wednesday, released a new article today exposing the role of Canada's police and churches in sex crimes and child trafficking, including the abuse of Native women and children.

Kevin Annett, a community minister, was assaulted by two men in Vancouver's downtown eastside on Wednesday, Jan. Jan. 6, 2010, just two days after he published an article on church and government complicity in child trafficking on Canada's west coast.
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1960s child exodus still echoes in Cuba

Institutational Abuse

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By Shasta Darlington, CNN

Havana, Cuba (CNN) -- Marina Ochoa keeps a handful of photos of her little brother in a faded yellow envelope.

She has a black-and-white snapshot of him as a baby and some color portraits of him as a successful banker in Miami, Florida.
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The Lost Children

Institutational Abuse

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It's a mind-boggling story, one that sounds more like a bad movie than reality. But it happened. In the two decades after World War II, 10,000 English children were sent to Australia, reports 60 Minutes II Correspondent Bob Simon. Many were mistreated and abused. All were lied to.
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Police's 25 failings in children's home sex inquiry

Institutational Abuse

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By Simon Bristow

A POLICE force failed to properly investigate allegations of physical and sexual abuse at a Roman Catholic children's home, a report has revealed.

A total of 25 complaints against Humberside Police were upheld in the highly critical report into the handling of Operation Aldgate, an inquiry into allegations of abuse at St William's Children's Home in Market Weighton, East Yorkshire.
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Man testifies he was paid hush money

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SPOKANE, Wash. -- A former resident of a home for troubled boys contended he was repeatedly abused by the facility's director more than 30 years ago and that the man paid him money years later to keep it quiet.

Michael A. Clarke, 44, testified Monday in a Superior Court trial over alleged abuse at the Morning Star Boy's Ranch on Spokane's South Hill. This is the first of 19 separate lawsuits filed against Morning Star.
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Orphanage survivors confront German leadership

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International effort to connect those who claim they were abused as children

By TAVIA D. GREEN The Leaf-Chronicle

The fight spans across the North Atlantic for Ziska Murphy of Clarksville, Christa Morse of Oklahoma, Jeanette Lankre of Florida and thousands of other German natives who say they endured physical, sexual and mental abuse while growing up in orphanages in Germany.

It is estimated more than half a million children brought up in German church and state institutions between 1945 and 1975 suffered such abuse, according to an article from DW-World DE, a German-based multimedia company.
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No apology for boys home victims

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Calls for the Catholic Church to apologise for abuse claims have fallen on deaf ears.

Residents of a former boys home in Shefford have long claimed they suffered abuse but, while paying out damages in two instances, the church has never admitted to doing anything wrong.
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Old System Where Catholic Orders Used Poor Kids for Slave Labor Described in Complaint

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By TIM HULL

(CN) - Members of two Catholic religious orders trafficked in children for decades, taking poor kids from their parents in Britain and Malta and promising to educate them in Australia, then putting them to a life of forced labor and physical and sexual abuse, according to a federal class action in Manhattan.

Three former "child migrants" say the Congregation of Christian Brothers and the Order of the Sisters of Mercy took subsidies from the British, Australian and Maltese governments for the children's upkeep and education, but kept the money for themselves and gave the children nothing save hardship and pain, forcing them to beg for scraps of food and root around in pig troughs for sustenance.
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CIA Involved In Child Sex Trade Since 1978

Institutational Abuse

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A top US intelligence source told WMR that the CIAs involvement in procuring children in Thailand for the purpose of engaging in sexual trysts with visiting VIPs from the United States, including members of Congress and high administration officials, began in earnest in 1978.
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Abused children revictimized by public institutions: Cornwall report

Institutational Abuseflag_canada Tag: canada

Commissioner Normand Glaudes report did not make a pronouncement on whether a pedophile ring existed or not, but he acknowledged that throughout the inquiry he heard evidence suggesting that there were joint cases of abuse. (CBC) Children in Cornwall, Ont., who were sexually abused or at risk of being abused were sometimes further harmed by the authorities entrusted to help them, a public inquiry has found.

The authorities singled out in the inquiry headed by Normand Glaude included police, churches and corrections officials. I find there were systematic failures in the response of institutions to allegation of sexual abuse of children and young people in this community, Glaude said in a statement Tuesday.
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Letterfrack: The 'Auschwitz' of Connemara

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A hellhole operated by the Irish Catholic Church and their 'satellite' The Irish 'Free' State.
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Eamonn McCann On The Irish Church & State Collusion In Child Rape

Institutational Abuse

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Theres scarcely a bishop in the 26 Irish dioceses who hasnt issued a statement in the past fortnight explaining how dismayed/distressed/shocked/bewildered hes been to discover the extent of the depravity perpetrated by priests and the failure of some of his fellow bishops to alert the civil authorities. Some of the more plausible performers have been wheeled out to widen their eyes for the cameras in displays of wonderment.I cannot begin to understand the mentality They still take the people for fools.

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Australian PM Kevin Rudd issues apology to British child migrants

Institutational Abuse
By Bonnie Malkin in Sydney

Kevin Rudd, the Australian prime minister, has issued an emotional apology to 7,000 British child migrants who suffered abuse and neglect in the country's state-run orphanages and religious institutions.
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Ordeal of Australia's child migrants

Institutational Abuse
By Nick Bryant BBC News, Australia

The story of the British child migrants sent to Australia has been described as a history of lies, deceit, cruelty and official disinterest and neglect.

Before being shipped out to Britain's distant dominion, many of the children were told their parents were dead, and that a more abundant life awaited them in Australia.
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Call for child abuse inquiry in NI

Institutational Abuse
Victims of child abuse in church and state-run institutions in Northern Ireland have called for an investigation similar to the Ryan report.

A Belfast solicitor acting for some of the victims has written to the First and Deputy First Ministers detailing their demands.
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Ritual Abuse: Canada's Most Infamous Trial On Child Abuse

Institutational Abuseflag_canada Tag: canada

Ritual Abuse: Canada,s Most Infamous Trial On Child Abuse Kevin Marron ? It began as a highly unusual custody battle and escalated into the most infamous child abuse trial in Canadian history.
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Suit: School knew of sex abuse for decades

Institutational Abuse
NEW YORK, Oct. 27 (UPI) -- The football coach at a New York private school molested students for decades and school officials knew about it, a federal lawsuit against the school alleges.
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Australia's forgotten children

Institutational Abuse
By Kathy Marks

They thought they were going to a land of milk and honey, but instead Britain's war orphans were subjected to appalling abuse and cruelty. Finally their story is being acknowledged.

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Bindoon Boys Town: The sad truth behind Britain's lost children

Institutational Abuse
By Kathy Marks

Australia is to apologise for the appalling treatment meted out to thousands of boys and girls shipped to its shores as orphans

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Irish Abuse: Asylums and Spirituality

Institutational Abuseflag_ireland Tag: ireland

By Anthony Stevens-Arroyo

The 2,600-page final report of Ireland's Commission to Inquire Into Child Abuse reported decades of mistreatment described by commentators as "off the scale." The abuses cited are mostly non-sexual in nature - about 82% of condemned acts were in the form of imposed physical pain and punishments.

Commenting on this overview, Catholic League President, Dr. William Donohue draws the conclusion that the Commission's use of the word "abuses" feeds into an anti-Catholic bigotry that offers "a huge market for such distortions." No doubt some Catholics will agree with Dr. Donohue. The temptation is to interpret such scandals the work of "a few bad apples." This approach leaves the institution off the hook and places all blame on low-level staff.
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Dail debate part 3

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Catherine Byrne

We have all heard the land of saints and scholars being mentioned during this debate. I want to know where the saints were while the little children threaded wire until their fingers bled to make rosary beads and where the scholars were, doubtless locked up in their ivory towers behind closed doors. Why did they not use their wisdom and knowledge to cry Stop? Instead they allowed the children to suffer at the hands of Satan.

These landmark buildings, which were institutions of terror, should all be wiped from the landscape forever. People have suffered enough and should not be constantly reminded of what has happened to them when they pass these monuments of cruelty.
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Three of 3,000

Institutational AbusePETER WALSH Transcontinental Media

Former students at aboriginal residential schools tell their stories of loneliness, struggle and abuse

Cindy Lyall wanted her friend Emma Reelis at her side before she was ready to talk. Both are Inuit women from Happy Valley-Goose Bay who now live in St. John's. They are among 3000 former students of aboriginal residential schools now suing the federal government over alleged abuse.
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Irish child abuse: the particular sufferings of the disabled

Institutational Abuseflag_ireland Tag: ireland

Earlier this week, as David Sharrock reports, thousands marched through Dublin in protest at what is turning out to be one of the darkest chapters in the history of Ireland and the Roman Catholic Church.

Soon after the Ryan report was published, David Sharrock, who writes for The Times in Ireland, wrote a powerful column. He reported the appearance of Michael OBrien on the RT show Questions and Answers, the Republics equivalent of the BBCs Question Time.

Michael listened patiently to the answers given by politicians to his question about whether the assets of religious orders found guilty by a commission report of systemic, endemic child abuse should be frozen.
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Child abuse by Catholic institutions condemned by Irish marchers

Institutational Abuseflag_ireland Tag: ireland

A sombre silence fell over Dublin yesterday when thousands of men, women and children marched through the capital to highlight decades of abuse in Catholic-run residential institutions, a shameful secret exposed last month by a government report.

Hundreds of thousands of children passed through orphanages and care homes run by religious orders, including the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy.
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State cannot just absolve itself of blame for abuse

Institutational AbuseBy Editor Saturday

THE State cannot just absolve itself of blame for the horrific systemic abuse of children in institutions run by religious orders, as outlined last week in the Report of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, by merely putting the moral imperative on these orders to come up with further cash to compensate and help the victims. It is not that simple.
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Shock over child abuse 'under shadow of the cross', says minister

Institutational Abuseflag_ireland Tag: ireland

GERRY MORIARTY, Northern Editor

PRESBYTERIAN ASSEMBLY: IT IS particularly shocking that vulnerable people were brutalised under the shadow of the cross, a Dublin city minister told the Presbyterian Assembly in Belfast.

A Dublin lay member of the church also told the Assembly yesterday that an unusual outcome of the Ryan report was that it was likely to persuade more people to support the Lisbon Treaty.
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Floggings and 'sadistic cruelty'

Institutational AbuseDAINGEAN WAS, according to the commission, different from all the other institutions into which it inquired. Unlike the children in industrial schools, most of the residents had been convicted of criminal offences that would, in the case of adults, have been punishable by imprisonment. The boys were aged between 12 and 17.
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Endemic rape and abuse of Irish children in Catholic care, inquiry finds

Institutational Abuseflag_ireland Tag: ireland

Henry McDonald, Ireland correspondent

Beatings and humiliation by nuns and priests were common at institutions that held up to 30,000 children, Ryan report states
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Former orphanage wards 'denied abuse counselling'

Institutational AbuseAt least three former residents of the Goodwood orphanage in Adelaide say they have been refused counselling and compensation from the Catholic Church over incidents of child abuse.
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More orphanage victims fight for compensation

Institutational AbuseBy Simon Royal

The old Goodwood orphanage in Adelaide is at the centre of child abuse complaints dated back to the 1940s.

The Catholic Church has recognised this with a counselling and compensation program for former residents.
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Sex abuse: State says sorry

Institutational AbuseSydney - An Australian state government and several churches issued a joint apology on Tuesday to children who were sexually abused while in their care.
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Canada Offers an Apology for Native Students Abuse

Institutational AbuseOTTAWA The government of Canada formally apologized on Wednesday to Native Canadians for forcing about 150,000 native children into government-financed residential schools where many suffered physical and sexual abuse.
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SA apology for child sex abuse victims

Institutational AbuseThe South Australian Parliament will formally apologise to former wards of the state who were victims of child sexual abuse.
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Mullighan report reveals decades of state care sex abuse

Institutational AbuseCOLIN JAMES, LEGAL AFFAIRS EDITOR


THE horrific extent of sex abuse against children in state care over four decades has been revealed in the 600-page report of the Mullighan inquiry to State Parliament.
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Senate Report into the forgotten Australians: Child abuse in institutional care

Institutational AbuseBen Mathews
On Line Opinion: Australia's e-journal of Social and Political Debate, 9 September 2004
Commentary by Dr Ben Mathews on the Senate Report into Forgotten Australians (below). Dr Mathews is a lecturer in the School of Law, Queensland University of Technology.
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Australian church apologies to child migrants

Institutational AbuseAustralia's Roman Catholic Church publicly apologised on Thursday to British and Maltese child migrants who suffered abuse including rape, whippings and slave labour in religious institutions.
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Uncovering 'Britain's most shameful secret'

Institutational AbuseUncovering 'Britain's most shameful secret'

British officials have been involved in a "top level cover-up" over the forced migration of vulnerable children, a Labour MP claimed on Wednesday.
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Deported children seek justice

Institutational AbuseSome of the children were told they were going to Australia for a holiday

Theresa Whitfield was eight years old when she left Britain to begin a new life in Australia. She is now an adult, and hoping for compensation for the childhood she says was stolen from her.
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The children Britain did not want

Institutational AbuseChildren were forced to work for long hours and little pay

Thirty years after Britain stopped sending its children overseas to other commonwealth countries, an investigation gets underway into the practice. It follows a legal battle by what became known as the 'child migrants'.