Experts investigating abuse within Northern Ireland children’s homes appealed this week for victims living abroad, chiefly in North America and Australia, to provide testimony so that the full scope of trauma can be documented.
Northern Ireland’s Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry said it already has received abuse complaints from 271 former residents of about 35 orphanages and state-funded homes where children allegedly suffered sexual or physical harm. The investigation started this year and is supposed to publish findings and recommend compensation for victims by January 2016. It seeks evidence of abuse from 1922, the year of Northern Ireland’s foundation, to 1995.
