GREECE: 52-yr-old cleric arrested for sexually abusing refugee children

Police authorities in Greece have arrested a 52-year-old French cleric for allegedly molesting and abusing unaccompanied refugee minors after offering them food and shelter.

According to police reports, the cleric who belongs to the Franciscan Church of France allegedly molested four homeless Pakistani boys, aged 14 to 18 in his house in Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-biggest city.

The children, who had been sleeping rough around Thessaloniki’s main railway station, told police officials that they accepted to stay at the man’s home in January after he had offered to provide them with food and housing.

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“When questioned, the children said they suffered repeated and persistent sexual abuse by the man,” a police spokeswoman told Al Jazeera on Wednesday.

“They say that he took advantage of the fact that they were homeless and without food to sexually abuse them.”

Reports say the assault became known when the boys fled the cleric’s house and one of them found refuge in a Thessaloniki centre for vulnerable migrants where he revealed the abuse to the centre’s staff who in turn reported to the police.

 

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