In Papua New Guinea the Catholic Church has convened a special meeting to address the issue of crimes and murders against persons suspected of having practiced black magic.
In Papua women accused of black magic or witchcraft are often victims of summary executions.
The Bishop of Mendi, Donald Lippert, has organised the meeting.
It will take place at the end of October.
“It is impossible to control people’s beliefs, but one can control their actions,” he says.
“Attacks on people suspected of practicing black magic will stop only when the authors are condemned”.
According to some observers, the problem is impunity and the Government of Papua does not seem to want to deal with it effectively.
In 2013, after a global scandal sparked by the murders of women suspected of having practiced evil, the Parliament of Papua New Guinea abolished the Witchcraft Act of 1971.
That law divided witchcraft in “good” and “bad”.
Since then, any killing of a person suspected of witchcraft is murder.
But the law is not enforced and the government does not push the police and judges to intervene in these crimes.
Mendi is the provincial capital of the Southern Highlands Province.
Bishop Donald Lippert is a Capuchin-Franciscan and was born in Pittsburgh, USA.
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