The Vatican commission’s report is the first assessment of the church’s efforts to address the clergy sexual abuse crisis.

The Catholic Church must allow victims of sexual abuse by its clergy the right to compensation and make it easier to remove priests, the Vatican’s Child Protection Commission says in its first annual report.

The 50-page report, released Tuesday, is the first global assessment of the church’s efforts to address the crisis of sexual abuse within its ranks.

For decades, the church has been rocked by worldwide scandals involving pedophile priests and the cover-up of their crimes, damaging its credibility and costing it hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements.

The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, established by Pope Francis a decade ago, said the church was emerging from a “dark period” in which “church leaders have tragically failed those we are called to shepherd.”

US Cardinal Sean O’Malley, a former Boston archbishop who has spent decades listening to abuse survivors, told a news conference that a new era had begun “where responsibility, care and concern for victims is beginning to bring light in the dark”.

The commission emphasized “the importance of reparation to victims/survivors as a concrete commitment in their healing journey” and committed to work “so that standardized and known procedures are developed more comprehensively.”

There needs to be a clear policy on compensation, which is not just financial, he said, but which also acknowledges “mistakes, (issues) public apologies”.

The commission said it would delve into the issue of reparations in its report next year.

Tuesday’s report also called for victims to be given greater access to documents concerning them, a clearer division of roles between Vatican departments dealing with abuse and more effective punishment of perpetrators.

Francis was most recently discussed with the issue during his September visit to Belgium, where both the king and the prime minister called for more concrete action.

Francis has taken a number of steps to combat abuse since becoming the church’s leader in 2013, such as punishing high-ranking clergy while making it mandatory to report suspected sexual abuse to church authorities.

But clergy still have no obligation to report abuse to civil authorities unless that country’s laws require it, while any disclosures made during confessions remain private.

On Saturday, a summit of the world’s bishops at the Vatican ended with officials apologizing in a written statement for the “unspeakable and continuing” pain suffered by abuse victims.

They stated the need for “a disciplinary or administrative procedure that provides an effective way to resign or be removed from office.”

But Tuesday’s report did not provide details on how this should be done and did not specify whether action would be taken against priests convicted of abuse or only suspected.

The Vatican commission faced harsh criticism from abuse survivors, who said it failed to implement effective reforms to protect children.

The report warns that progress around the world has varied dramatically. In some regions, clerical abuse was not yet a “publicized problem within their societies,” he said, while calling safeguards “inadequate” in parts of Central and South America, Africa and Asia.