Panfilo is the Archbishop of the Rabaul archdiocese in Papua New Guinea.

He speaking after, a now laicised priest, Philip Kelerea, was last month found guilty in the National Court in Kokopo of sexually abusing boys.

Kelerea had been working in the Malakur ward, of the Pomio district.

Panfilo says it has been made clear to children and their parents that they had every right to bring priests who commit sexual abuse to court.

He said there are protocols within the Catholic Church for addressing issues child abuse.

"As for PNG, there are protocols in place on how to handle cases of sexual abuse," he said.

"However, the church leaders are yet to sit down and look at ways of implementing that protocol."

The Archbishop said the protocol would look at ways to prevent sexual abuse of children from happening again.

After Kelerea was found guilty Panfilo sent all the necessary documents on the case to the Vatican.

On 29 March the Vatican informed him that Pope Francis had laicised Kererea.

Source

• The National
• The National
• Image: cogicabusewatch

He was responding to concern that pupils from an Upper Hutt Catholic primary school went to a prayer group that included a convicted paedophile

St Joseph's Primary School in Upper Hutt says the nearby parish knew about the man's convictions but never warned the school.

St Joseph's parish says it did not warn the school as there were no rules requiring it to do so.

The Catholic Education Office says that while that's true, it would have been prudent to keep the man well away from children.

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