French Catholic Church had estimated 3000 paedophiles since 1950s - commission head - Reuters

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Stained-glass windows are seen inside the Reims Cathedral, built in the Gothic style and a UNESCO world heritage site, where 31 kings of France were coronated, in Reims, France, April 18, 2019. Picture taken April 18, 2019. REUTERS/Charles Platiau

PARIS, Oct 3 (Reuters) - The French Catholic Church has had an estimated 3,000 paedophiles in its ranks over the past 70 years, the head of an independent commission investigating the sex abuse scandal said in an interview published on Sunday.

The commission is due to publish its findings on Tuesday, which will mark the culmination of 2-1/2 years of work, probing allegations of abuse going back to the 1950s.

"We have estimated the number (of paedophiles) as standing at 3,000, out of 115,000 priests and religious officials, going back to the 1950s," commission head Jean-Marc Sauve told the Journal du Dimanche paper.

A spokesperson representing the French Catholic Bishops' Conference declined to comment on Sauve's remarks.

A Vatican spokesperson said it would wait for the full report to be published before deciding on whether to comment.

The scandal in the French Church is the latest to hit the Roman Catholic Church, which has been rocked by sexual abuse scandals around the world, often involving children, over the past 20 years.

The French Church's official Twitter account (@Eglisecatho) posted a prayer in support of the victims on Sunday.

The French Church, which has seen dwindling numbers of faithful in recent years, said in March it would propose financial compensation to those who were victims of abuse.

Last month, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Cologne decided to take a "spiritual time-out" from his duties after committing grave errors in a crisis over clerical sexual abuse. read more

A report published last year in Britain said the Catholic Church received more than 900 complaints involving over 3,000 instances of child sex abuse in England and Wales between 1970 and 2015, and that there have been more than 100 reported allegations a year since 2016.

Reporting by Gilles Guillaume and Philip Pullella; Editing by Frances Kerry

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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