SE Asian govts told to fight against child sex tourism
SE Asian govts told to fight against child sex tourism
Agencies, Phnom Penh
Southeast Asian governments should make concerted efforts in cracking down on child sex tourism, which is on the rise across the region, activists and officials told a conference on Friday.
"Child sex tourism is like a balloon. If you put pressure on one country, offenders will go to another where the laws are lax and they think they won't get caught," said Christine Beddoe, program manager of Child Wise, an Australian-based nonprofit group working to protect children from sexual exploitation.
"What we need to do is to put pressure together in all countries at the same time" so there is no room for offenders to escape, she said.
Her message came at the opening of a two-day regional meeting in Cambodia on the prevention of child abuse in tourism destinations.
Cambodian authorities were warned on Friday that the country's booming tourism industry could attract more unwanted paedophiles.
Cambodian representative of the World Vision relief agency, Laurence Gray, said up to one million people were expected to visit Cambodia in 2003 and the number of visiting paedophiles could rise accordingly.
"There is an idea that Cambodia is an easy place where children are accessible, they are cheap and if you're caught and go to court, you can pay your way out," he told AFP at the conference.
Tourism is one of Cambodia's few thriving industries and is a lucrative source for desperately needed foreign cash. About 600,000 tourists visited here in 2001 compared with just 280,000 in 1998.
Since 1998, when nearly three decades of civil war finally ended, Cambodia has also earned a reputation as a haven for paedophiles.
Gray said this perception had to be changed through efforts by the government which must continue its clampdown on child sex offenders.
Only two foreigners have to date been found guilty of paedophilia here: in 2000 a British man was jailed for three years and in July this year an Italian was jailed for 10 years in the stiffest sentence handed down so far.
"It is clear that tourists have both a positive and negative impact," said Thong Khon, secretary of state for the tourism ministry. "Some of them come to have sex with children."
"It is the world's concern, not just Cambodia, everybody is concerned over this problem," he said. "All these disgusting activities are taking place in both developed and developing countries."
A World Vision and Cambodian government survey of children exposed to paedophilia released in December estimated that Western paedophiles accounted for about 38 percent of all child sex offenders operating here.
Tourism is a major source of income for members of ASEAN, which groups Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.
But in Cambodia, the increase of child sex is encouraged by poverty, loose law enforcement and rampant corruption.
Delegates from Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam are attending the meeting, the first of three meetings Child Wise is planning to hold with other ASEAN countries during the following years, said Beddoe.
She said the meeting aims to achieve a "regional action plan" for combating child sex abuse in tourism destinations in ASEAN.
She said the action plan is designed to deliver a message to offenders that "going to a tourist destination doesn't mean that you'll get away with abusing children."