Worldwide, 05 June 2023

The sexual abuse survivor group SNAP Aotearoa says New Zealand’s sovereignty is being compromised with the concealment of sex abuse crimes through the political privilege and immunity granted by the NZ Government to The Holy See - the political entity state of the Roman Catholic Church.

SNAP Aotearoa has used the King’s Birthday to ask the Governor General to help remove the Catholic state’s political privilege which they say has become a mechanism for avoiding the course of justice in New Zealand.

SNAP is asking the Governor-General to break diplomatic relations with The Holy See on the basis of demonstrable abuse of such privileges by the Catholic Church in New Zealand.

“Our nation is effectively being made complicit in the concealment of paedophile crime because it has granted a form of political immunity to the Catholic Church, but only to that church, which its leaders are exploiting to impede justice in our county for thousands of child victims of clergy sexual violence over decades,” says SNAP Aotearoa National Leader Christopher Longhurst.

SNAP has asked the Governor-General if she will help remove the “unjust privileges and protections” that have “created whakanoa amongst our people”, and help lead New Zealand “towards freedom from such corruption, towards hohou rongo, the restoration of right relationships.”

A copy of the letter is here. 

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