MEXICO: Child Sexual Exploitation Fuelled, Protected by Economic Clout

[childadvocate]

http://ritualabuse.us
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34126

By Adrián Reyes MEXICO CITY, Jul 27, 2009 (IPS) - While the Mexican
government is touting the imprisonment of businessman Jean Succar,
accused of running a child sex ring, as evidence of its tough stance
against child sexual exploitation, authorities also admit that the
number of minors subjected to such crimes has increased from 16,000 to
20,000 over the last six years.

Paedophilia and sexual exploitation of minors are not classified as
serious offences in almost half of Mexico's 31 states, increasing the
likelihood of impunity, according to Ana Rosa Payán, general director
of the Office and System of Integral Development for Family Welfare
(DIF), created in 1970....

Journalist Lydia Cacho told IPS that the Mexican state has failed to
effectively address the needs and protection of victims, and some
organisations, such as the DIF, have even "allowed some minors to fall
into the hands" of sexual abusers.

"Mexico is a paradise for child prostitution and pornography, because
these rings have enough economic power to corrupt and operate with
impunity," said Cacho. Her book, "Los demonios del Edén" (The Demons
of Eden), contains the personal accounts of minors who talk about the
sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of a child prostitution and
pornography racket she alleges was run by Succar.

She added that the abuse and sexual exploitation of minors is closely
linked to other phenomena, such as organised crime, drug trafficking
and money laundering.
The 43-year-old activist and writer herself has been under police
protection since she began to receive threats last year, after she was
arrested by the police, driven 900 km to the state of Puebla, held for
30 hours, mistreated and threatened....

When the news of her arrest broke, the rights watchdog Amnesty
International, the World Organisation Against Torture, the Inter-
American Press Association and other international groups raised an
outcry, and Cacho was released on bail.

Cacho, also the co-founder of the Centro Integral para Mujeres
Víctimas de la Violencia (CIAM), a shelter for victims of domestic
violence and rape in the southeast tourist mecca of Cancún, has also
warned of paedophilia rings in Jalisco and Guerrero, southwestern
states with major tourism resorts like Puerto Vallarta and Acapulco.
Deputy Rodrigo Iván Cortés, of the ruling conservative National Action
Party (PAN), agrees that the paedophilia case in Cancún is not an
isolated incident, saying Acapulco also is plagued with the scourge,
fuelled by people with great economic clout.

Cortés, a member of the special parliamentary commission on children,
adolescents and family, lamented that the "pettiness" of other
political sectors in the Chamber of Deputies blocked significant
progress on more stringent legal measures that would have facilitated
the fight against organised crime....

The legislator pointed to the creation of the "Cyber Police," in the
Office of the Public Prosecutor, as a major step forward in combating
and stamping out paedophile rings. The task force has shut down more
than 400 Internet sites that had been distributing child pornography.

Mexico has joined the fight against international paedophile rings and
has focused particularly on the distribution of material over the
Internet, said Cortés. He added that perpetrators tend to become
addicted to their deviant behaviour and progress to more serious
crimes....

Cacho, who worked with several of the victims through her
organisation, told IPS that the younger victims "suffered horrifying
and unimaginable abuse - they were tortured." All the more reason for
judicial authorities and the federal government to ensure that this
high profile child abuse case does not go unpunished, she added.
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34126