A major investigation by our Newsquest sister newspaper The Impartial Reporter in County Fermanagh has shone a spotlight on a dark past in which scores of children regardless of religion were repeatedly sexually abused.

Since March over 60 alleged victims have claimed they were abused as children – and now we are publishing this story in the hope that other victims originally from that part on Northern Ireland who are now living in other parts of the UK come forward.

A plethora of allegations have been made against teachers, bus drivers, police officers, businessmen, members of the Orange Order and criminal gangs with some notable themes: the widespread abuse of power by those tasked with keeping children safe, the apparent inaction of police or the prosecution system, and the lack of justice for those victims.

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It was almost as a by-product of a bitter and nasty war while a beleaguered police force struggled to keep up. Sex abuse, it would seem, was used almost as a weapon against children and a veil of secrecy ensured such depravity was kept hidden for several decades.

It was February 3, 2001 as police in white suits and masks crawled on their hands and knees in the dirt, desperately searching for bits of his body and clues to the identity of his killer.

A windswept, isolated bog near Belcoo right on Fermanagh’s border with Cavan in the Republic of Ireland was a lonely place to die, but David Sullivan was a lonely man, a pitiful recluse.

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'John' (not his real name) told the Fermanagh newspaper that chain-smoking Sullivan sexually abused him on his school bus 12 times when he was a boy, abuse that would last for almost five years. It is the first time anyone has spoken about the wickedness committed by a man who was never prosecuted.

The notorious paedophile first allegedly raped him on his school bus when he was 12, pouncing on him in a layby near Lisnaskea. The internal lights were switched off as he abused him before the sun had even risen that cold, dark winter morning.

"I can do what I want," he chillingly told his young victim, looking over his thick glasses. And he did. He got away with abusing this victim and potentially dozens of other victims for years.

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Sullivan spent much of his time driving his white, specially adapted Hyundai on the roads at all hours.

Teenage boys were regularly seen entering and leaving Sullivan's flat. Police are convinced too that he was involved with businessmen and professionals in a paedophile ring, shocking revelations that were first revealed by The Impartial Reporter.

This is a significant moment as we delve deeper and deeper into a murky past that saw innocent children raped by evil men again and again and again and were never brought before the courts or, in Sullivan's case, ended up rotting in an Irish bog.

There are many questions now for the authorities, particularly the police, about Fermanagh’s murky past.

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Do you have information relating to alleged child sex abuse in Northern Ireland, in County Fermanagh or the Border counties of the Republic of Ireland?

Do you have information on child sex abuse relating to David Sullivan, the Orange Order or any other individual or institution?

Contact journalist Rodney Edwards in the strictest of confidence on redwards@impartialreporter.com, 028 66 32 44 22 or Twitter @rodneyedwards