NEW DELHI: Indian authorities charged a Roman Catholic bishop on Tuesday with repeatedly raping a nun in her rural convent, a case that helped make the sexual abuse of nuns a major issue in the church.
Bishop Franco Mulakkal was charged with rape, illegal confinement and intimidation, said Hari Sankar, a district police chief in the southern state of Kerala, India’s Catholic heartland.
The nun who made the accusations, who has not been publicly identified, said she went to police last year only after complaining repeatedly to church authorities. Eventually, a group of fellow nuns launched unprecedented public protests to demand Mulakkal’s arrest. He was arrested but released after a few weeks.
Mulakkal was the official patron of the nun’s community, the Missionaries of Jesus, and wielded immense influence over its budgets and job assignments. The nun said the rapes occurred between 2014 and 2016.
Mulakkal has denied the accusations, calling them “baseless and concocted” and saying the accusing nun was trying to pressure him to get a better job.
In February, Pope Francis for the first time publicly acknowledged the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops.
Speaking to reporters aboard the papal plane, Francis vowed to confront the problem. “Should we do something more? Yes. Is there the will? Yes. But it’s a path that we have already begun,” he said.
The Mulakkal case has split India’s Catholic community, with many people defending the bishop.
In March, the founder of the Vatican’s women’s magazine, along with the magazine’s all-female editorial board, quit their positions, saying a Vatican campaign to discredit them had increased since they denounced the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops.
Catholic bishop charged with repeatedly raping nun
Catholic bishop charged with repeatedly raping nun
- In February, Pope Francis for the first time publicly acknowledged the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops
- The Mulakkal case has split India’s Catholic community, with many people defending the bishop
Afghanistan says working with Tajikistan to investigate deadly border clash
- Tajikistan shares a mountainous border of about 1,350 kilometers (839 miles) with Afghanistan and has had tense relations with Kabul’s Taliban authorities, who returned to power in 2021
KABUL: Afghanistan’s Taliban authorities said Saturday they were working with neighboring Tajikistan to investigate a border clash earlier this week that killed five people, including two Tajik guards.
Tajikistan announced on Thursday that three members of a “terrorist” group had crossed into the Central Asian country “illegally” at Khatlon province, which borders Afghanistan.
Tajik security forces killed the trio, but two border guards also died in the clash, the Tajik national security committee said.
Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said on Saturday that “we have started serious investigations into” the recent “incidents” on Tajik soil.
“I spoke to the foreign minister of Tajikistan and we are working together to prevent such incidents,” he told an event in Kabul.
“We are worried that some malicious circles want to destroy the relations between two neighboring countries,” the minister added, without elaborating.
Tajikistan shares a mountainous border of about 1,350 kilometers (839 miles) with Afghanistan and has had tense relations with Kabul’s Taliban authorities, who returned to power in 2021.
Unlike other Central Asian leaders, Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon, who has been in power since 1992, has criticized the Taliban and urged them to respect the rights of ethnic Tajiks in Afghanistan.
At least five Chinese nationals were killed and several wounded in two separate attacks along the border with Afghanistan in late November and early December, according to Tajik authorities.
According to a UN report in December, the jihadist group Jamaat Ansarullah “has fighters spread across different regions of Afghanistan” with a primary goal “to destabilize the situation in Tajikistan.”
Dushanbe is also concerned about the presence in Afghanistan of members of the terrorist organization Daesh in Khorasan.
