Global shame as children gather to talk about sex exploitation

It is to the world’s shame that hundreds of youngsters - including many from the Asia-Pacific - are meeting in Brazil this week to talk to governments and activists about the global sexual exploitation of boys and girls for profit.

While it is a very good thing that children have been invited to the third World Congress Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents it is also a reflection of the failure of countries worldwide to do more to protect children from the worst forms of abuse.   In many ways, the internet and technology are increasing the risks for children.

According to UNICEF around two million children – a total equal to all Sweden’s children – are now every year being exploited through prostitution or pornography. It is a sad truth that the problem cannot be solved unless children are invited to be part of the solution.

In the 12 years since the first congress held in Stockholm things have moved on. The sexual abuse of children at the hands of tourists, brothel owners and traffickers was a major talking point back in 1996.  Much has been done since then to raise awareness, engage hotels and tourism authorities and introduce laws to protect children. Child victims are now more likely to be recognised as survivors rather than criminals.

But the crisis facing children remains prevalent and is in many cases worsening thanks to the internet.  In response, governments must be vigilant to these changing patterns and nimble in responding if they are to help vulnerable children and prevent abuse.

Traditionally, poverty has been a major driver for child exploitation. Street children are much more likely to be abused than those living in stable families.  The disparity in wealth and opportunities between the countryside and the city, or between neighbouring nations, is also sucking children into dangerous situations where they can be deceived of their dreams and exploited.  The current global financial crisis may exacerbate this.

In some areas progress in protecting children has been made. New laws have been passed by Western countries that demand tourists who sexually abuse children overseas be returned and tried at home.  In Thailand, the prostitution of minors is no longer openly tolerated.  In Cambodia the government clamped down, closing down a notorious brothel village near Phnom Penh where underage sex was sold.  Police have been trained to spot child abuse and poster campaigns engage the public in fighting it.

Southeast Asian governments are also now working together to return and rehabilitate child victims of sex trafficking, introducing tougher laws and holding one another to account.  In India, the government banned under-14-year-olds from being hired as domestics, where they were at risk of sexual abuse.

However, enforcement remains patchy. It is not difficult to find children being sold for sex in parts of Asia – or indeed in countries in Europe, the Americas and Africa.  In Asia there is still the false premise that child sex abusers are white male tourists overlooking the many youngsters abused by Asians. Asian governments also lag behind in terms of implementing extra-territorial laws that can bring child abusers home for trial.

But there is also a more permissive global – not just Western – trend in which children are not only being sold the message that their self worth depends on having the latest brands or cell phone – and are in some cases selling themselves to buy these luxuries - but are themselves being dehumanised through advertisements or music videos that sexualise and commercialise youth.So while on paper, children’s rights and legal protections are being strengthened the shifting cultural backdrop is rapidly changing the very way we view children and the way children view themselves.  These harmful attitudes combined with new technologies are putting children from all social backgrounds in harms way.

The internet and the proliferation of mobile phones with video and photo sharing capability are potentially exposing children to online predators and pornographers. The role that teachers, family and friends traditionally played in protecting children from abusers is failing because children spend more time on line where they are at risk of being socialised by the moral lows of the internet and where abusers can anonymously make direct contact.

Much more needs to be done to police the internet to prevent hard-core images of children being shared, to combat abusers who now transmit encrypted images to buyers or who groom children on line in an attempt to meet them or persuade them to ‘perform’ via web cams.

The internet now allows a child to be abused a thousand times over and in perpetuity since a single image can be shared instantly with a vast network of viewers and remains on hard drives whenever it is shared.  In addition, the web allows opportunistic paedophiles or those with latent tendencies to access images, further building the demand for photos and video of child abuse.

The pornification of the internet is doubly harmful to children since exploitive images are now so easily viewable to young people themselves, corrupting and sexualising boys’ views of girls, and girls views of themselves, and even leading children to take sexual images of one another to share via the web.

Until recently it was chiefly poor children who were at most risk from commercial sexual exploitation due to their poverty and vulnerability.  Now any child with a computer and an internet connection is in danger.

The growth of the internet, especially in Asia, where only 15 percent of the population – some 600 million people – are users, highlights the huge potential for further exploitation in this area.  According to the United States FBI, child pornography is already a multi-billion dollar industry.   In recent years there has been a stream of arrests and raids involving individuals and networks. Police typically seize thousands of images of abused children, including of toddlers.  Most of these children are never found.

Leading child rights organisations like World Vision have together brought 300 children to Rio de Janeiro. Some of them are the survivors of exploitation. They will be sharing how they have been at the forefront of efforts to warn youngsters about the dangers of trafficking and the internet, and persuading governments to do much more to protect them.

Children are telling us they want adults to do more.  They want their families to make better money so children are not handed over to brokers whose promise of a good job only leads to the brothel; they want their friends educated about on-line risks and the internet censored; they want their families to love and protect them not sell them; they want their border police to be clean rather than bribed by traffickers; they want their governments to listen to and stand up for them.

In an ideal world there would be no fourth congress on the sexual exploitation of children.  It would be wonderful not to hear children’s voices debate such exploitation.  Can we build a world that finds it unacceptable to sexually exploit a child for profit?

Laurence Gray is World Vision’s Advocacy Director for the Asia Pacific and is attending the World Congress World Congress III Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents. He can be contacted for further comment or interview: +668 18452807