'Attempts to link Pope Benedict XVI to a widening child sex scandal have failed, the Vatican said today, a day after it emerged that the pontiff had helped a clergyman suspected of child sex abuse.
"It is clearly evident that in the past few days there are some who have sought -- with a dogged focus on Regensburg and Munich -- elements to personally implicate the Holy Father in questions of abuse," spokesman Federico Lombardi said.
"It is clear that these efforts have failed," he said on Radio Vatican.
On Friday, the Pope's former diocese of Munich confirmed a report that, as an Archbishop in 1980, the pontiff approved housing for a priest, who was accused of forcing an 11-year-old boy to perform oral sex.
Six years later, the priest was given a suspended prison sentence for child sex offences. The archdiocese said he still works in Bavaria, with no known repeat violations.
The disclosure added to a widening scandal in Germany that had already come close to Pope Benedict's brother Georg Ratzinger, a former choirmaster.
The first revelations emerged in January when an elite Jesuit school in Berlin admitted systematic sexual abuse of pupils by two priests in the 1970s and 1980s.
Among other boarding schools implicated is one attached to the Domspatzen ("Cathedral Sparrows"), Regensburg cathedral's thousand-year-old choir which was run for 30 years by the pope's older brother.
Ratzinger, 86, said on Tuesday that the alleged sexual abuse in the 1950s and 1960s -- before his time -- was "never discussed".
Vatican spokesman Lombardi said that the Pope "encouraged" "recognising the truth and helping victims" in cases of abuse, adding that the line of the Church was not "to cover up these offences but ... to judge and adequately punish" offenders.
A proliferation of abuse scandals across Europe has prompted deep soul-searching among church leaders, not least in Germany where 19 of the 27 dioceses have been implicated in allegations.
Most of the priests concerned are not expected to face criminal charges because the alleged crimes took place too long ago. But there have been growing calls for a change in the law and for the church to pay compensation.
Benedict has spoken out several times since the start of his papacy in 2005 to condemn paedophilia among clergymen, and he has met with abuse victims in Australia and the United States.
In February, he met with top church officials in Ireland where a similar scandal was compounded by evidence that the hierarchy covered up for predators. The Pope then called child abuse a "heinous crime" and a "grave sin".