Hundreds of homeless boys and girls in the Philippines were caged in brutal detention centres to clean up the streets of Manila for the visit of Pope Francis on Jan. 15, Thursday in the largely Catholic country, Daily Mail reported.
A senior official in one of the detention centres in Manila admitted to the publication that police and government workers had an intensive round-up to ensure Pope Francis will not see the homeless children.
By accompanying 71-year-old Nobel Peace Prize-nominated Irish missionary Father Shay Cullen, the publication managed to gain rare access to one of the detention centres. Cullen set one of the homeless boys and took him to his Preda Foundation shelter for children in Subic Bay.
Weeks before Pope Francis' visit in the Philippines, police and officials were said to have lock up the homeless children in the prisons, where adult criminals were detained, which is a blatant abuse of the child protection laws of the country led by President Benigno Aquino Jr.
Moreover, the detention centres were described as filthy and the homeless children have sleep on concrete floors as older inmates and adult prisoners reportedly beat and abuse the children and sometimes starve and chain them to pillars.
On Jan. 17, Sunday, Pope Francis will conduct an open air mass in Manila's Rizal Park, which is expected to be attended by six million people. The mass will be aired worldwide and it appears that the Philippine officials are determined to keep the homeless children from view.
After visiting Sri Lanka, Pope Francis will visit the Philippines, which is the final leg of his Asian tour.
Police and officials in the Philippines have yet to comment on the news.