The Vatican today expressed "astonishment" and "dismay" that Belgian police raided the home and former office of the recently retired archbishop of Belgium as part of an investigation into child abuse by priests.

The Vatican said any sinful and criminal abuse of children from members of the church must be condemned. But in a statement today it expressed its "astonishment at the way in which the search took place".

The statement by the Vatican's Secretariat of State condemned what it said was the violation of the confidentiality owed to victims of child abuse.

Police seized the records of an independent panel investigating sexual abuse by priests, some 500 cases in all. The victims are mostly men now in their 60s and 70s.

Separately, police took a computer from the home of Cardinal Godfried Danneels, the former archbishop.

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