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C S E C

The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children

In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to 2025                                    gvnet.com/childprostitution/Spain.htm

Kingdom of Spain

Spain's mixed capitalist economy supports a GDP that on a per capita basis is approaching that of the largest West European economies.

After considerable success since the mid-1990s in reducing unemployment to a 2007 low of 8%, Spain suffered a major spike in unemployment in the last few months of 2008, finishing the year with an unemployment rate over 13%.  [The World Factbook, U.S.C.I.A. 2009]

Description: Spain

CAUTION:  The following links and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Spain.  Some of these links may lead to websites that present allegations that are unsubstantiated, misleading or even false.   No attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content.

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

Ministry of Labor and Immigration
91 363 23 30
Country code: 34-

 

*** FEATURED ARTICLE ***

ECPAT: CSEC Overview - Country Report

www.ecpat.net/eng/ecpat_inter/Country/CSECOverview/Spain.html

[Last access date unavailable]

In recent years the Spanish Government has started showing more attention to the problem of Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children. Cases of organized trafficking of women and girls for sexual exploitation and numerous investigations of child pornography networks with links in the country through Internet have put pressure on the Government to take action, in cooperation with local and international NGOs as well as with other European governments.

 

*** ARCHIVES ***

ECPAT Country Monitoring Report [PDF]

Kristal Pineros, ECPAT International, 2012

www.ecpat.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/A4A_V2_EU_SPAIN.pdf

[accessed 8 September 2020]

[SPANISH]

Desk review of existing information on the sexual exploitation of children (SEC) in Spain. 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/spain/

[accessed 8 September 2020]

SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN - The law criminalizes the “abuse and sexual attack of minors” younger than age 13 and sets the penalty at imprisonment from two to 15 years, depending on the nature of the crime. Individuals who contact children younger than age 13 through the internet for the purpose of sexual exploitation face imprisonment for one to three years. Authorities enforced the law.

The minimum age for consensual sex in the country is 16. The law defines sexual acts committed against persons younger than age 16 as nonconsensual sexual abuse and provides for sentences from two to 15 years in prison, depending on the circumstances.

The penalty for recruiting children or persons with disabilities into prostitution is imprisonment from one to five years. The penalty for subjecting children to prostitution is imprisonment from four to six years.

The commercial sexual exploitation of trafficked teenage girls remained a problem (see also the Department of State’s Trafficking in Persons Report at https://www.state.gov/trafficking-in-persons-report/).

The law prohibits using a minor “to prepare any type of pornographic material” as well as producing, selling, distributing, displaying, or facilitating the production, sale, dissemination, or exhibition of “any type” of child pornography by “any means.” The penalty is one to five years’ imprisonment; if the child is younger than age of 13, the length of imprisonment is five to nine years. The law also penalizes knowingly possessing child pornography.

There is a registry for sex offenders to bar them from activities in which they could be in the presence of minors.

Concluding Observations Of The Committee On The Rights Of The Child (CRC)

UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 7 June 2002

www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/spain2002.html

[accessed 24 December 2010]

[48] The Committee expresses its concern at reports of child prostitution in the suburbs of large cities and in holiday resorts, involving vulnerable children living on the fringes of society.

10% of the Spanish know cases of child sex tourism

Euskal Irrati Telebista (Basque Radio-television) EITB

upgrade69new.bnvillage.co.uk/showthread.php?t=86730

[accessed 24 July 2011]

[scroll down to #23]

One out of ten Spanish citizens knows or has heard someone of his surroundings say that he has had sex relations with children during a trip to developing countries, according to the report "Sexual exploitation of children during travels," unveiled Wednesday by UNICEF.

The profile of this kind of people, according to UNICEF, is not that of a pederast, but of an "occasional sexual abuser," more exactly a man aged between 40 and 60 who is in search of adult prostitution and ends up having sex with a child. The main sex tourism destinations are the Caribbean Islands and Central America, UNICEF said.

Five Years After Stockholm [PDF]

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 – SPAIN – ECPAT Spain has stated that Spanish society is not aware of the problem of CSEC and that there are few reports of the problem in the media.  Furthermore, the lack of studies and statistics on the problem are obstacles to the development of a good plan to combat CSEC.  ECPAT Spain’s current efforts focus on public awareness and education.

Report by Special Rapporteur [DOC]

U.N. Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights, Fifty ninth session, 6 January 2003

www.unhchr.ch/Huridocda/Huridoca.nsf/0/217511d4440fc9d6c1256cda003c3a00/$FILE/G0310090.doc

[accessed 18 September 2011]

[66] The Penal Code criminalizes the authors and the accomplices of those who sell and traffic children, and who induce or facilitate the involvement of children in prostitution and pornography.  Law 5/2000 regulates the legal responsibility of children aged between 14 and 18 who are involved in the commission of offences covered by the Penal Code, as well as describing the special measures in the judicial process to which juvenile delinquents are entitled.  Concerning aggression and sexual abuse, the Penal Code provides for harsher penalties when the victim is under 13.

Spanish police have broken up a gang of Romanian human traffickers

Siskind's Immigration Bulletin

www.andalucia.co.uk/channels/html/news/news_in_spain_and_europe_1336.html

[accessed 4 September 2014]

INTERNATIONAL ROUNDUP - Spanish police have broken up a gang of Romanian human traffickers who were faking identity documents and credit cards. Twenty-two people have been arrested, the majority of them Romanians.  The gang specialized in bringing Romanian women, often under-age girls, to Spain to force them into prostitution.

FG Smashes Human Trafficking Syndicate

Kingsley Newzeh & Iyefu Adoba, This Day, Abuja, 25 January 2005

www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-127782432/fg-smashes-human-trafficking.html

[accessed 24 June 2013]

The Executive Secretary said, from evidence uncovered so far, investigators suspect that they may be keeping at least 20 young Nigerian girls in sexual slavery in Spain.

ECPAT Spain launches a new Campaign Against CSEC

ECPAT International Spain, 23 June 2004

At one time this article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here]

[accessed 24 July 2011]

A campaign has been launched in Spain against the commercial sexual exploitation of children in travel and tourism. The campaign’s main goal is the prevention of CSEC by raising the awareness of people traveling from Spain to tourist destinations known to offer the opportunity to engage in sexual relationships with minors.

MEXICO: En Los Bares Mexicanos Se Alquilan A Bebés Menores De Seis Meses

Leticia Robles de la Rosa, Nacional, 2005-10-20

www.cronica.com.mx/nota.php?id_nota=208126

[accessed 24 July 2011]

Spanish: Las niñas mexicanas vírgenes de 12 años, por ejemplo, son vendidas a los burdeles españoles en 25 mil dólares, pero si se trata de pequeñas indígenas bellas, el precio aumenta, pues los "clientes" las cotizan como un atractivo adicional.

English: "Twelve-year-old virgin Mexican girls, for example, are sold to brothels in Spain for $25,000, but if a beautiful young Indigenous girl is being sold, that raises the price even more because she is [exotic]."

 

*** EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE ***

 

Human Rights Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices

U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, March 8, 2006

2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61676.htm

[accessed 11 February 2020]

CHILDREN - Child prostitution occurred.  Trafficking in teenage girls for the purpose of sexual exploitation was a problem.

TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS - The country was both a destination and transit country for trafficked persons for the purpose of sexual exploitation (most frequently involving forced prostitution and work in nude dancing clubs) and, to a lesser degree, forced labor (primarily agriculture, construction, and domestic employment). Trafficked women were usually 18 to 30 years of age, but some girls were as young as age 16.

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