CHILDREN: Mexico Ignores Seriousness of Child Prostitution

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, May 5 1998 (IPS) - Mexico is cheating the international community with its closed defensive attitude on the child sex networks, a phenomenon the United Nations (UN) claims is on the increase in this country.

Most of the tourism, customs and migration officials in Mexico “deny the problem exists, which is unfortunate,” said the UN report presented by Ofelia Calceta, special rapporteur on the sale of children and child prostitution.

The document, released Tuesday in the capital, revealed that “legal loopholes and disparities” plague the battle against the sexual abuse of children, stating that some authorities which should be dealing with the problem are more concerned with “political questions.”

Around 100 Mexican children and adolescents fall into the hands of the child sex networks each month, according to calculations by local non governmental groups.

Calceta visited Mexico in November last year, alarmed by the wave of denunciations and evidence which followed the disarming of a criminal organisation producing and selling child pornography in 1996.

She said that during her visit she had discovered the complicity of some authorities, especially the police, with those responsible for the sexual exploitation of children, “perpetuating a culture of impunity.”

During her visit, Calceta had also presented the Ernesto Zedillo government with a document, discussing the situation, explaining the main victims are normally children who live and work in the streets.

The Mexican authorities starting to take note of the problem after the US police arrested members of a band distributing pornographic videos and pictures, and sending images of naked children via e-mail. Their investigation showed the material was produced in Mexico.

Two months later, Mexican authorities arrested six people in the resort of Acapulco, confiscating drugs, video and photographic equipment, along with sadomasochistic instruments, weapons and around 20 pornographic films, most of them involving children of less than 10 years old.

After revising the confiscated material, the Attorney General’s Office said the criminals had used children ranging from new born babies to adolescents of 18 years old.

The investigations revealed the network was supported by payments received from some 4,600 US clients.

The UN special rapporteur said, even though the case discovered in the United States was uncovered and investigated in Mexico, customs officials still deny there is any sexual exploitation of children in the country.

The attitude of the customs and tourism sector officials prevents more in depth study taking place into the sexual abuse of children and pornography trafficking along the frontier with the United States, where the problem is on the increase, said Calceta.

It is clear the networks producing child pornography in Mexico prefer the frontier cities, as it is easier to transport the material to the United States from there, she said.

According to Elena Azona, a specialist on the issue, there are currently some 5,000 children linked to prostitution, pornography and sex tourism in Mexico.

Calceta’s report said the worst child prostitution problems exist in the frontier cities of Tijuana and Juarez, the resorts of Jalapa and Cancun and the port of Veracruz.

The authorities of Mexico City dismantled a prostitution network protected by police in March. According to the investigations, the prostitutes were all under the age of consent and nearly all came from rural areas.