The Northern Irish government issues a public apology on Friday (March 11) for a scandal of sexual abuse and ill-treatment in children's institutions throughout the 20th century, after years of delay and in the midst of a political crisis.
Read alsoNorthern Ireland under the crossfire of London and the European Union
This public apology will be made by members of the five main political parties at Stormont, the seat of Northern Irish local government in Belfast.
Completed in 2017, a four-year investigation uncovered widespread mistreatment in religiously-run institutions for children believed to be responsible for systemic failures.
Apologies are also expected from them.
Among the recommendations in the final report was a call for a public apology for the victims.
Such a speech was initially expected from Northern Ireland's First Minister Paul Givan and Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill, but the resignation of the head of local government in early February, due to dissatisfaction over customs controls post-Brexit, led to the fall of the duo at the head of the local executive and cast uncertainty over this long-awaited moment.
These apologies have become like "
a political football match
" for years, Margaret McGuckin, president of the SAVIA (Survivors and Victims of Institutional Abuse) association, told AFP.
Protected abusers
" A
lot of people need to hear
'
I'm sorry, it's not your fault
,'" she said, comparing Friday's event to British Prime Minister David Cameron's apology in 2010 for the Bloody Sunday massacre, where 12 Irish Catholic demonstrators were killed by the British army in 1972 in Londonderry, the second city of the British province.
Margaret McGuckin herself suffered ill-treatment in one of the four houses run by the order of the Catholic Sisters of Nazareth, the subject of the greatest number of complaints during the investigation.
Her brother Kevin claimed to have been sexually abused in a house run by a Catholic order from
Read alsoSexual violence: family, Church, school ... the share of child abuse revealed by Inserm
A total of 493 people have come forward to report abuse, testifying in Northern Ireland, the rest of the UK, Ireland and Australia.
The report particularly blamed the serial failures of the police to investigate these accusations, as well as the role of the Catholic Church in protecting the perpetrators of these attacks.
He highlighted "
evidence
" attesting to sexual, physical and psychological abuse, "
negligence and unacceptable practices
" in most of the institutions under investigation, between 1922 and 1995.
"Simply Fair"
Among them, 22 institutions were managed by the State, the Church and associations.
On Wednesday, British Minister for Northern Ireland Brandon Lewis said it was "
just right
" for the victims to receive the apology.
“
For too many years the voices of the victims and their cries for help have not been heard.
On March 11 they will receive the full and unconditional apology they so deserve
,” he told a parliamentary question session on Northern Ireland.
The island of Ireland has been repeatedly rocked by cases of child abuse.
Last October, police in Northern Ireland opened an investigation into allegations of sexual and physical assault at women's institutions run by the Catholic and Protestant Churches, where thousands of single mothers have been ostracized from society for decades.
In the neighboring Republic of Ireland, a report revealed that 9,000 children deemed illegitimate had died between 1922 and 1998 in establishments run by the State and the Catholic Church, a scandal which had led in January 2021 the Irish Prime Minister, Michael Martin, to issue an official state apology.
SEE ALSO -
The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland announces his resignation amid post-Brexit discontent
