Nearly 4,400 people have been abused by Catholic priests in Italy in cases reported since 2020, a victims’ group alleged on Friday, renewing pressure on bishops to confront a crisis that has long plagued the world’s largest Christian faith.

The unofficial tally by Rete l’Abuso, Italy’s largest church abuse victims’ group, is based on victims’ accounts, judicial sources and cases reported by the media, the founder of the association, Francesco Zanard,i said.

Rete l’Abuso did not say how far back the alleged abuse cases occurred.

The Italian Bishops Conference (CEI), which was criticised by the Vatican’s child protection commission last week, had no comment on the findings, a spokesperson said.

Most allegations concern abuse by priests

The global Catholic Church has been shaken for decades by scandals involving paedophile priests and the cover-up of their crimes, but local church leaders in Italy have been less forthcoming in confronting the issue.

New Pope Leo, who met survivors of sexual abuse by clergy for the first time this week, has told the Church’s newest bishops not to hide misconduct allegations. His predecessor, the late Pope Francis, made addressing the issue a priority of his 12-year papacy, but with mixed results.

In an unusually critical report on the issue published on October 16, the Vatican’s child protection commission said only 81 of Italy’s 226 dioceses responded to a questionnaire about safeguarding practices it had drafted.

Rete l’Abuso said it had documented 1,250 suspected cases of abuse — some with multiple victims — including 1,106 allegedly committed by priests, with the rest attributed to nuns, religion teachers, lay volunteers, educators and scout members.

Its report contained cases related to 4,625 victims — or survivors, as the association calls them — including 4,395 abused by priests.

The report said 4,451 of the survivors were under 18, and an almost equally large number — 4,108 — were male, Rete l’Abuso said, adding that five nuns, 156 vulnerable adults and 11 people with disabilities were also among the victims.

According to the association, out of the 1,106 suspected predator priests, only 76 were subjected to church trials, with 17 temporarily suspended, seven moved to other parishes and 18 were defrocked or resigned from the priesthood. Five died by suicide, it added.

A TikTok video circulating online, featuring a news broadcast, claims to show Punjab’s Senior Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb announcing a complete lockdown on the weekends due to rising smog in Lahore and Multan.

The claim is false. The video is not recent, and no such decision has been made by the Punjab government as of October 24.

Claim

“There will be a complete lockdown in Lahore and Multan next Friday, Saturday and Sunday, says Marriyum Aurangzeb,” read an Urdu-language text overlaid on a video posted on TikTok on October 19.

The video includes a graphic from a private news channel with the text: “All types of construction will be banned as well, said Marriyum Aurangzeb.”

At the time of writing, the post had been viewed over 453,000 times, shared more than 1,160 times, and liked over 9,300 times.

A similar claim was also shared on the same platform here.

Fact

The video circulating online is from last year, and the Punjab government has not recently announced a lockdown in Lahore or Multan due to poor air quality.

Geo Fact Check traced the viral video to a press conference by Minister Aurangzeb, aired on November 15, 2024, when she announced a three-day lockdown in Lahore and Multan due to the intense smog.

Furthermore, Punjab Information Minister Azma Zahid Bokhari told Geo Fact Check over the phone: “There is absolutely no possibility of any lockdown and no decision has been made about it [as yet].”

Verdict: The lockdown announcement from November 2024 has been falsely shared as a recent lockdown announcement in Lahore and Multan.

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A pilot executed an emergency landing on the sands of Huntington Beach late Thursday evening, October 23, after a single-engine aircraft suffered a complete engine failure.

No injuries are reported following the incident. This marks the third aviation crisis in Southern California in the past three weeks.

The aircraft is identified as a 1973 Cessna 172 that had departed from Santa Barbara Airport en route to John Wayne Airport around 8:30 p.m.

After an hour into the flight, the pilot reported a loss of engine power and an inability to reach the intended destination.

Corbin Carson, Huntington Beach’s public affairs manager stated, “The pilot landed the aircraft on the shore after reporting engine trouble and being unable to return to John Wayne Airport.”

The situation was examined from the air by the Huntington Beach Police Department’s helicopter, HB-1, whose pilot overheard the distress calls.

The pilot of the Cessna used his visual contact with the helicopter crew and masterfully steered the plane towards a soft landing between the Lifeguard Towers 11 and 13 near the pier at around 9:30 p.m.

“The landing was incidental and both the pilot and passenger, along with other bystanders on the beach, were not hurt,” the authorities confirmed.

The plane had not been damaged during the landing, requiring heavy machinery to be taken off the beach.

The landing and emergency landing are the third and fourth recent aviation accidents in the region, after a helicopter crash in Huntington Beach, which hospitalized five people and a forced landing of a plane in Long Beach on October 21.

The Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) have also been informed and will also begin investigations on the cause of engine failure.