International roundup

By Agencies
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Retired Pope Benedict XVI asked forgiveness Tuesday for any “grievous faults” in his handling of clergy sex abuse cases, but denied any personal or specific wrongdoing after an independent report criticized his actions in four cases while he was archbishop of Munich, Germany.

Benedict’s lack of a personal apology or admission of guilt immediately riled sex abuse survivors, who said his response reflected the Catholic hierarchy’s “permanent” refusal to accept responsibility for the rape and sodomy of children by priests.

Benedict, 94, was responding to a Jan. 20 report from a German law firm that had been commissioned by the German Catholic Church to look into how cases of sexual abuse were handled in the Munich archdiocese between 1945 and 2019. 

Benedict, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, headed the archdiocese from 1977 to 1982.

The report faulted Benedict’s handling of four cases during his time as archbishop, accusing him of misconduct for having failed to restrict the ministry of the four priests even after they had been convicted criminally. 

The report also faulted his predecessors and successors, estimating there had been at least 497 abuse victims over the decades and at least 235 suspected perpetrators.

The Vatican released a letter that Benedict wrote to respond to the allegations, alongside a more technical reply from his lawyers who had provided an initial 82-page response to the law firm about his nearly five-year tenure in Munich.

The conclusion of Benedict’s lawyers was resolute: 

“As an archbishop, Cardinal Ratzinger was not involved in any cover-up of acts of abuse,” they wrote.

“I have had great responsibilities in the Catholic Church. All the greater is my pain for the abuses and the errors that occurred in those different places during the time of my mandate,” the retired pope meanwhile said in his letter. 

Benedict issued what he called a “confession,” though he didn’t confess to any specific fault. 

He recalled that daily Mass begins with believers confessing their sins and asking forgiveness for their faults and even their “grievous faults.” 

Benedict noted that in his meetings with abuse victims while he was pope, “I have seen at firsthand the effects of a most grievous fault.

“And I have come to understand that we ourselves are drawn into this grievous fault whenever we neglect it or fail to confront it with the necessary decisiveness and responsibility, as too often happened and continues to happen,” he wrote. 

“As in those meetings, once again I can only express to all the victims of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness.”

His response drew swift criticism from Eckiger Tisch, a group representing German clergy abuse survivors, who said it fit into the church’s “permanent relativizing on matters of abuse — wrongdoing and mistakes took place, but no one takes concrete responsibility,” the group said.

“Joseph Ratzinger can’t bring himself simply to state that he is sorry not to have done more to protect the children entrusted to his church,” the group said.

NICARAGUA

Nicaragua said it has lodged a diplomatic protest over an alleged incursion by naval boats from El Salvador in its waters in the Pacific.

The Nicaraguan government news site El 19 Digital said Wednesday that Nicaragua protested what it called a violation of its sovereignty.

The alleged incursion occurred in the Gulf of Fonseca, which is shared by Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador. 

There was no immediate response from the Salvadoran government.

According to Nicaragua, on Feb. 4 and 6, 2 Salvadoran military vessels sailed within 50 and 26 nautical miles of Nicaragua’s Cosigüina Point, which sticks out into the Gulf.

Nicaraguan Coast Guard crews asked the Salvadoran ships what they were doing there, but the Salvadorans denied they were in Nicaraguan waters.

In October, Nicaragua and neighboring Honduras agreed to mark their territorial limits in the Gulf of Fonseca, but El Salvador did not join the agreement.

Honduras has been disputing ownership of the tiny island of Conejo in the Gulf with El Salvador.

HONDURAS

The Biden administration last year quietly placed former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández on a classified list of officials suspected of corruption or undermining democracy in Central America, according to the State Department, which made the designation public Monday.

The list was provided last summer to the U.S. Congress in compliance with legislation pushed by former Congressman Eliot Engel, who chaired the House Foreign Affairs Committee before being defeated in a Democratic primary in 2020.

The publication of the so-called Engel List fell like a bombshell in Central America, containing the names of another former Honduran president, Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo Sosa, among more than 50 active lawmakers, top politicians and former officials in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras — the so-called “Northern Triangle” countries.

But one notable omission was Hernández, who was in power at the time but reeling from accusations that surfaced in the drug trafficking trial of his brother, ex lawmaker Antonio “Tony” Hernández, that his political ascent had been funded by bribes from drug traffickers. 

Tony Hernández was sentenced in New York in March to life in prison.

Individuals on the list are generally ineligible for visas and admission to the U.S.

“The United States’ commitment to fighting corruption and promoting democracy, rule of law, and accountability in support of the people of Central America is ironclad,” the State Department said in a statement, citing “multiple, credible media reports” that Hernández had engaged in significant acts of corruption by taking payments from drug traffickers.

With Hernández’s stepping down last month, the State Department considered it was no longer necessary to maintain secrecy, two people familiar with the sanction said on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations.

Pressure has been building in Washington to go after Hernández as his successor, Xiomara Castro, seeks to improve relations with the U.S.