The Vatican has disciplined an elderly Polish cardinal who was accused of sexually abusing a minor, the latest of several clerics to be caught up in a widening scandal in the homeland of the late Pope John Paul II.
The Vatican's nunciature (embassy) in Poland said Cardinal Henryk Gulbinowicz, 97, the former archbishop of Wroclaw, was disciplined after an investigation of "allegations regarding the cardinal's past".
It gave no details but last year the Gazeta Wyborcza newspaper published an article by a man who accused Gulbinowicz of sexually abusing him when he was a minor in the 1990s and a student in a Catholic seminary.
The case was brought to prosecutors but they could not proceed because of the statue of limitations. At the time, the cardinal's lawyer said the accusations were false and the lawyer declined to comment on Friday when contacted by Reuters.
