SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — El Salvador's top Roman Catholic cleric has apologized for the alleged sexual abuse by a priest of an unidentified minor 25 years ago.

San Salvador Archbishop José Luis Escobar Alas said in a news conference after celebrating Sunday Mass that "we have apologized to the victim and now I am repeating it publicly."

He asked people for forgiveness as well as prayers "for the victim and also for the priest."

In 2016, the church defrocked three Salvadoran priests after they were found guilty of sexually abusing children.

This year, it defrocked another following a canonical process in which the priest confessed guilt; he was also convicted in a Salvadoran court and sentenced to 16 years in prison.