Abuse victims ask pope for audience

(ANSA) - Paris, March 14 - A group of victims of sexual abuse by a Catholic priest in the 1980s have written a letter to Pope Francis requesting a private audience in the Vatican, said French daily Le Parisien on Monday.
    The victims are former scouts from the outskirts of Lyon who accused Father Bernard Preynat of abuse through the early 1990s.
    The letter asks for an explanation of why Preynat wasn't suspended until 2015, despite the fact that Lyon archbishop Cardinal Philippe Barbarin was informed of the abuse in 2007.
    "Locking himself in silence, our cardinal lost all credibility," the letter said, appealing to Pope Francis as "our supreme moral reference", without, however, asking for any specific disciplinary actions or sanctions against Barbarin.