Two men are preparing to sue the Government of the Northwest Territories for not protecting them from harm while they were in the government's care as youth.

They have filed an application with the Northwest Territories Supreme Court in Yellowknife asking a judge to allow them to sue the territorial government without their names being put into the publicly available court record.

They're asking that only their lawyer, the judge and the territorial government know their real identities.

The names of alleged sexual assault victims are generally written in court documents but court-imposed publication bans typically forbid media outlets from publishing them.

The men are asking to be identified only as "John Doe 15" and "John Doe 16."

In court documents, they claim they were repeatedly raped and molested as children at what is named the Inuvik Child Welfare Centre from 1989 to 1999.

They say the territorial government ran the centre and failed to protect them from harm while they were in care.

The court documents do not specify what kind of compensation they will be asking for.

They're set to make their case to sue without publicly identifying themselves on Dec. 1.