C S E C The Commercial Sexual
Exploitation of Children In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to
2025 gvnet.com/childprostitution/Mexico.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the
situation in HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspects of child prostitution are of
particular interest to you. You might
be interested in exploring how children got started, how they survive, and
how some succeed in leaving. Perhaps
your paper could focus on runaways and the abuse that led to their
leaving. Other factors of interest
might be poverty, rejection, drug dependence, coercion, violence, addiction,
hunger, neglect, etc. On the other
hand, you might choose to write about the manipulative and dangerous adults
who control this activity. There is a
lot to the subject of Child Prostitution.
Scan other countries as well as this one. Draw comparisons between activity in
adjacent countries and/or regions.
Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper resources
that are available on-line. Teachers Check out some of
the Resources
for Teachers attached to this website. HELP for Victims Procuraduria General de la Republica ***
FEATURED ARTICLE *** Mexican Journalist
Risks Life to Expose Child Sex Rings R.M. Arrieta, El Tecolote, San
Francisco, Apr 29, 2007 laprensa-sandiego.org/archieve/2007/may11-07/cacho.htm [accessed 4 February
2015] Mexican journalist
Lydia Cacho is exposing the players in these
Cancun-based sex rings, and risking her life for it. Her awareness led
her to a life of activism and journalism. She started a high-security shelter
for abused women in Cancun where children opened up to her about the dark underworld
of child porn rings and prostitution. As a result, she says, “I’ve been
taken to jail for telling other people’s stories. No one imagines that The underage sex
rings she has exposed include Child Prostitution:
A Growing Scourge W. E. Gutman, The www.thepanamanews.com/pn/v_10/issue_07/travel_01.html [accessed 20 June
2011] lab.org.uk/sex-tourism-threatens-central-americas-youth [accessed 5 November
2016] lab.org.uk/sex-tourism-threatens-central-america%E2%80%99s-youth/ [accessed 23 October
2017] A REGION OUT OF
CONTROL
- Mexico - More than 16,000 children are sexually exploited through networks
involving foreigners and military, police, government and business
officials. In Juarez alone, nearly 1,000 children are being sexually
exploited, and in Guadalajara, officials report 750 cases of child
prostitution. The US-Mexican border is one of the main centers for
child sex tourism. Sterile at Age 12,
AIDS at 14 Diego Cevallos, Inter Press Service News Agency www.ipsnews.net/1998/02/rights-mexico-sterile-at-age-12-aids-at-14/ [accessed 6 October
2012] Thousands of
children in Mexico, victims of mafias involved in the appalling but
profitable business of child prostitution and pornography, face a dismal
future: sterility at age 12, an abortion at 13 or AIDS at 14. There is “great
demand” for child prostitution and pornography, whose main victims are
children who live and work in the streets, “greater than the demand for
adults and even more profitable,” says a government report released this
week. According to the UN
children’s fund, UNICEF, nine million children – out of a total population of
91 million – live in absolute poverty in Mexico, 60,000 of them on the
streets. ***
ARCHIVES *** ECPAT Country
Monitoring Report [PDF] ECPAT International,
2014 www.ecpat.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/IMP%20MEXICO.pdf [accessed 3
September 2020] [SPANISH] Desk review of
existing information on the sexual exploitation of children (SEC) in Mexico.
The report looks at protection mechanisms, responses, preventive measures,
child and youth participation in fighting SEC, and makes recommendations for
action against SEC. Human
Rights Reports » 2019 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, March 10, 2020 www.state.gov/reports/2019-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/mexico/ [accessed 3
September 2020] SEXUAL
EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN - The law prohibits the commercial sexual exploitation
of children, and authorities generally enforced the law. Nonetheless, NGOs
reported sexual exploitation of minors, as well as child sex tourism in
resort towns and northern border areas. Statutory rape is a
federal crime. If an adult is convicted of having sexual relations with a
minor, the penalty is between three months and 30 years’ imprisonment
depending on the age of the victim. Conviction for selling, distributing, or
promoting pornography to a minor stipulates a prison term of six months to
five years. For involving minors in acts of sexual exhibitionism or the
production, facilitation, reproduction, distribution, sale, and purchase of
child pornography, the law mandates seven to 12 years’ imprisonment and a
fine. Perpetrators
convicted of promoting, publicizing, or facilitating sexual tourism involving
minors face seven to 12 years’ imprisonment and a fine. Conviction for sexual
exploitation of a minor carries an eight- to 15-year prison sentence and a fine. The
leader of the Light of the World megachurch is being held in U.S. custody on
rape, trafficking and child pornography charges Christine Murray,
Thomson Reuters Foundation, 17 August
2020 news.trust.org/item/20200817201221-s80um [accessed 18 August
2020] The leader of the
church is being held in U.S. custody on rape, human trafficking and child
pornography charges, but a report filed with Mexican authorities in July 2019
has not progressed, they said. Sochil Martin, who
complained to Mexican prosecutors and earlier this year filed a U.S. civil
suit, has claimed she was abused for 22 years as she grew up in the church. She has said she
was enslaved and trafficked by church leaders in California and Mexico,
repeatedly raped and severely beaten. Martin has said her
family groomed her from childhood to become a sexual slave to its leaders
until she escaped the church, which is headquartered in Guadalajara and
follows what it says are early Christian teachings. Leader Naason Joaquin Garcia, who is being held in California on
$90 million bail, has maintained his innocence. Concluding
Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the
Rights of the Child, , 8 October 1999 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/mexico1999.html [accessed 20
February 2011] [31] In view of the
assessment and recommendations made by the Special Rapporteur on the sale of
children, child prostitution and child pornography regarding the situation of
the sexual exploitation of children in Mexico, the Committee welcomes the
measures taken by the State party to combat this phenomenon, in particular,
the establishment of the Inter-institutional Commission to Eradicate the
Sexual Exploitation of Children. [32] While the
Committee is aware of the measures taken by the State party on the situation
of repatriated children (menores fronterizos), it remains particularly concerned that a
great number of these children are victims of trafficking networks, which use
them for sexual or economic exploitation. Concern is also expressed about the
increasing number of cases of trafficking and sale of children from
neighboring countries who are brought into the State party to work in
prostitution. Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique, allafrica.com/stories/200805050033.html [partially accessed
20 June 2011 - access restricted] Of the 11 winners
of the prize to date, three of them were unable to attend the prize-giving
ceremonies because they were in jail, and one (last year's
winner, the Russian Anna Politkovskaya) because she
had been murdered. Lidia Cacho was more fortunate - she was in A freelance
reporter based in Cancun, Cacho has contributed
regularly to the daily newspaper "La Voz del
Caribe", denouncing organised rings of child
prostitution and paedophilia, and other instances
of organised crime. She wrote a book, "Demons
of Eden", which named prominent politicians involved in child
prostitution rackets. "This
award", Cacho said, "may not protect me
from death threats or from death itself. But it certainly helps to protect my
written work and to enable a broader audience to know and understand the
Mexican reality and the impact of the global crimes of trafficking in persons
and of child pornography" Gateways to
exploitation Globe and Mail
Update, Nov. 10, 2007 www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/gateways-to-exploitation/article1089077/ [accessed 6 October
2012] Diego Cevallos, Inter Press Service News Agency www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39160 [accessed 20 June
2011] www.ipsnews.net/2007/09/mexico-key-video-evidence-blocked-in-child-sex-ring-trial/ [accessed 13
November 2016] A 2004 study by
researcher Elena Azaola estimated that some 17,000
children under the age of 18 are victims of the sex trade in Mexico. Like Cacho’s book, her study was based on interviews with
minors who managed to escape. In addition, the researcher collected
information in visits to establishments where underage girls and boys were
forced to work as prostitutes. RIGHTS-MEXICO:
16,000 Victims of Child Sexual Exploitation Emilio Godoy, Inter
Press Service News Agency www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=38872 [accessed 20
February 2011] www.ipsnews.net/2007/08/rights-mexico-16000-victims-of-child-sexual-exploitation/ [accessed 13
November 2016] International organisations fighting child sex tourism say Mexico is
one of the leading hotspots of child sexual exploitation, along with
Thailand, Cambodia, India, and Brazil. Another chilling
statistic is that 95 percent of Mexico City’s 13,000 street children have already
had at least one sexual encounter with an adult. Many girls and boys
are lured to Mexico City from small towns or rural areas by criminal
networks, through false promises of domestic work or other jobs. – htsccp Child Pornography
and Human Trafficking: Heather Gehlert, AlterNet, May 3, 2007 -- A conversation with
human rights activist Lydia Cacho Ribeiro on the
coastal city's violence and abuses -- and her lifelong mission to combat them www.alternet.org/rights/51326/?page=1 [accessed 20 June
2011] Cacho, one of Child Sex Abuse -
Everybody Knows, Nobody Says Diego Cevallos, Inter Press Service News Agency www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36857 [accessed 20 June
2011] www.ipsnews.net/2007/03/rights-mesoamerica-child-sex-abuse-everybody-knows-nobody-says/ [accessed 13
November 2016] Casa Alianza, which works with homeless children in several
Central American countries, estimates that between 35,000 and 50,000 children
are forced into prostitution in the region, and says that one of the driving
forces behind the abuses is, in fact, tourism. As for Mexico, the
End Child Prostitution, Pornography, and Trafficking of Children for Sexual
Purposes (ECPAT) network said it has become the major sex tourism destination
in the Americas. The number of children subjected to this form of
exploitation is estimated here at between 16,000 and 20,000. 16,000 Mexican
children suffer sexual abuse Xinhua News Agency,
October 26, 2006 www.india-forums.com/news/america/7061-16-000-mexican-children-suffer-sexual-abuse.htm [accessed 20 June
2011] According to the
official, 10 per cent of child prostitution took place in working-class areas
like La Merced, Garibaldi and Centro Historico,
where adult prostitution is an established tradition. The DIF president said in La Merced -- a
sprawling market surrounded by slums -- there are more than 2,000
prostitutes, of whom half are underage. Payán: Thousands abused
each year Wire services, El
Universal, April 26, 2006 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 20 June
2011] More than 20,000
minors were victims of child prostitution in DIF President Ana
Rosa Payán said in the news conference that child
abuse has increased considerably in the country since 2000 when there were
16,000 cases of these violations reported. Five Years After ECPAT: Fifth Report
on implementation of the Agenda for Action ECPAT International,
November 2001 www.no-trafficking.org/content/web/05reading_rooms/five_years_after_stockholm.pdf [accessed 13
September 2011] [B]
COUNTRY UPDATES – Child
prostitution on rise in border town United Press
International UPI, www.upi.com/Top_News/2005/04/04/Child-prostitution-on-rise-in-border-town/UPI-68091112646689/ [accessed 20 June
2011] Child prostitution
in the U.S.-Mexico border city of Threats Against
Sinaloa Journalist Who Investigated Child Prostitution Reporters-sans-frontieres (Reporters Without Borders), 3 February 2004 archives.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=9163 [accessed 13
Aug 2013] Reporters Without
Borders today called on the state prosecutor of the northern state of Sinaloa
to do everything possible to identify those responsible for the threats of
the past few months against Irene Medrano Villanueva, who has been
investigating child prostitution for some time. In a report published on 6 December, she
suggested that education department employees were involved in the corruption
of minors and a presumed prostitution network. Underage Sex
Workers in Mexico The banderasnews.com/0704/edat-mexprostitution.htm [accessed 6 October
2012] [scroll down] Mexico has no laws
defining or sanctioning child prostitution as criminal activity. An estimated 5,000 children are currently
involved in prostitution, pornography and sex-tourism in Boy
and Girl Victims of Sexual Exploitation in Elena Azaola, United Nations Children's Fund UNICEF and The
National System for Integral Family Development DIF, June 2000 www.sp2.upenn.edu/restes/Mexico_Final_Report_001015.pdf [accessed 20 June
2011] The principal
objectives behind the study are: 1) to
identify the nature, extension and causes of the commercial sexual
exploitation of girls and boys in the towns chosen; 2) to identify the ways in which they are
recruited, the modes of operating and movement of the children from one
region to another by the persons who exploit them and, 3) to collaborate closely with the local
and national authorities in order to collect the information that is needed
and use it to design policies that will make it possible to confront the phenomenon
and offer greater protection to the children. Mexico
Facts on Prostitution The Factbook on
Global Sexual Exploitation, Donna M. Hughes, Laura Joy Sporcic,
Nadine Z. Mendelsohn, Vanessa Chirgwin, Coalition
Against Trafficking in Women, 1999 www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes/mexico.htm [accessed 20 June
2011] The United Nations
now lists Fact Sheet:
Commercial Sexual Exploitation [PDF] United Nations
Children's Fund UNICEF, 22 July 2004 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 14 June
2011] FACTS
AND FIGURES
- An estimated 2 million children, the majority of them girls, are sexually exploited
in the multi-billion dollar commercial sex industry. An estimated 16,000
children in Women
and Children -- Labor Base of Mexican, North American Economy Dan La Botz, Mexican Labor News and Analysis, March 2nd, 1999 www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=799 [accessed 20 June
2011] Prostitution and Child
Prostitution - The most degrading and often dangerous work of women and
children can be found in prostitution. Tens of thousands of Mexican women and
girls (as well as men and boys) work as prostitutes in all of the major
cities of the country. A recent study by the Mexico City government Youth
Commission headed by Angeles Correa found that Mexico City had 50,000
prostitutes of whom 2,500 were minors. Elena Azaola
of the Center of Higher Research and Studies in Social Anthropology (CIESAS)
found that there were 5,000 child prostitutes in all of Mexico (90 percent
female). But Rosa Marta Cortina de Brown of the Female Association of Tourist
Enterprise Executive estimates that 250,000 children between 10 and 16 have
been the victims of "sexual tourism" in cities like Guadalajara,
Cancun, Acapulco, Puerto Vallarta and Tijuana. Recently there have also been
reports on child prostitution in Veracruz, Queretaro, and Ciudad Juarez.
Girls in prostitution face constant problems of possible pregnancy, immature childbirth,
violence, alcohol and drug addiction, sexual
transmitted diseases including HIV-AIDS. Malevolent
Bargains: Slavery Continues in the Form of Forced Prostitution Ed Vitagliano, News Editor, American Family Association AFA
Journal, April 2004 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 15
September 2011] AMERICAN TASTE FOR
TRAFFICKED GIRLS
- Virtual sex is not the only decadent delicacy for some Americans; the
simple fact is that thousands of trafficked women and girls are ferried into
the In an article for The
Weekly Standard, Hughes wrote about the extent of the sex trafficking
industry that shuttles girls through Mexico to brothels outside San Diego,
California. "Over a 10-year period, hundreds of girls, 12 to 18 years
old," were brought into the U.S. by Mexican nationals. "The girls were sold to farm workers
-- between 100 and 300 at a time -- in small 'caves' made of reeds in the
fields. Many of the girls had babies, who were used as hostages with death
threats against them, so their mothers would not try to escape," Hughes
said. Mexican Minors
Prostituted To Farmworkers Near La Frontera News, [accessed 15
September 2011] Told that they were
going to work in US factories or restaurants, these women and others like
them from poor Mexican communities were smuggled into the Lawmakers Want
Registry For Tourists Tim Weiner, The New
York Times, February 12, 2004 [accessed 20 June
2011] Members of Congress
are calling for a registry of foreign tourists as a way of combating a
perceived growth in the sexual abuse of children in Bringing street
kids to the light; New center in Kenneth D. MacHarg, Latin America Mission LAM News Service, across.co.nz/StreetKids-Mexico.htm [accessed 20 June
2011] In addition, they
have very little self-esteem. "A lot of kids don't believe that you can
love them just for who they are and they can't love themselves. They don't see themselves as worthy of
having something good happen in their lives," Sue observes. "The addiction
that is hardest for the kids is mistaking sex for love," she observes.
"They're involved in prostitution. They go through a feeling of being
unloved and uncared for. Many have
such a low self-esteem that they eventually go back to prostitution because
it is the only place they feel valued." Ashoka Fellow Profile -
Claudia Colimoro Sarellano Ashoka, 1998 www.ashoka.org/node/3045 [accessed 20 June
2011] www.ashoka.org/en/fellow/claudia-colimoro-sarellano [accessed 13
November 2016] Claudia, concerned
about the rise in child prostitution in Mexico, and conscious that the
principal victims are children of the streets, has created the Casa de las
Mercedes, a home for young women with no place to turn. 79% of the women in Casa de las Mercedes
began working as prostitutes between the ages of 12 and 18, and a few even
earlier. Since the appearance of AIDS, many clients of prostitutes have tried
to avoid the risk of this and other sexually transmitted diseases by seeking
sexual relations with younger women or girls who have little or no sexual
experience. Because of this, the demand for child prostitution has risen, and
it is not difficult to find prostitutes due to the miserable conditions in
which many children live. ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/62736.htm [accessed 10
February 2020] CHILDREN
-
Trafficking in children for the purpose of sexual exploitation was a problem. TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
- Although there were no reliable statistics on the extent of trafficking,
the government estimated that 20 thousand children were sexually exploited
each year. Sexual tourism and sexual exploitation of minors were significant
problems in the northern border area and in resort areas. Undocumented
migrants from All
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