A mother-of-four at the centre of a paedophelia case in Saint-Omer, northern France, has confessed in court to raping her own children, report agencies.

37-year-old Myriam Delay cried as she made her admission, adding that she had been raped as a child by her father, said the BBC.

 "I don't even remember playing with dolls or tea sets any more. I became an adult at the age of eight when my father raped me. I raped my own children,"  Delay told the court. "It's so hard. I don't understand why I did what I did."

Delay is one of 17 adults on trial for the alleged assaults involving 18 children, which took place in the northern town of Outreau. Fourteen of the defendants, aged 24 to 67, deny any involvement.

The child sex ring was reportedly run out of their residence in Outreau from 1995 to 2000, when social service workers alerted prosecutors who took custody of her four children. The children told investigators they had been fondled, raped, and coerced into performing sex acts, and named other individuals involved.

One of the accused committed suicide last year. Some of them are also charged with torture and other "barbaric acts" against minors. Many of the victims are the offspring of the defendants, and some will testify against their own parents.