An inquiry has found that teenage military recruits in Australia were horrifically abused both physically and sexually by senior officers as part of a sick initiation practice. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse started an inquiry this week into the conduct of the Australian military and its treatment of cadets at its facilities. They received no fewer than 111 reports of incidents of sexual abuse carried out against navy cadets as young as 15 in the 1960s right through to the 1980s. 50 cases are alleged to have taken place at HMAS Leeuwin from 1960 to 1980 and at the Balcombe Army Apprentice School between 1970 and 1980. This is the second major inquiry into sexual abuse at Australian military academies to take place in the last five years. Press TV reports: The inquiry revealed that the victims were sexually abused during their first six months at the Leeuwin base, in Perth’s south, in 1967. The survivors told the commission that their senior officers forced them to rape each other and perform horrific sex acts, causing some the recruits to commit suicide, according to the inquiry. A former Navy cadet, who served in in 1967, told the commission [...]
