Pope aide claims under-fire Vatican is victim of ‘conspiracy’

The Vatican has rejected fresh allegations linking Pope Benedict XVI to a cover-up of paedophile priests, even as international media reports accused the Church of moral bankruptcy and questioned the pontiff’s authority to continue to lead it.

L’Osservatore Romano , the Vatican newspaper, said in an editorial that Pope Benedict had always handled such cases with “transparency, purpose and severity.” It accused the international media of acting “with the clear and ignoble intent of trying to strike Benedict and his closest collaborators at any cost”. One of the Pope’s top aides, Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, said there was “a conspiracy” against the Church.

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