16,000 CHILDREN SEXUALLY EXPLOITED, UNICEF SAYS
Some 16,000 children in Mexico are sexually exploited through networks involving military, police, government and business officials and foreigners, UNICEF reports, revealing that child trafficking yields $7 billion in profits annually. The "weakness of legal controls" and poverty have made Mexico a paradise of prostitution and child pornography, according to a recent UNICEF report produced in collaboration with two local organisations.
"The use of children [in] pornographic material is
frequent," report says. The border between the United States and
Mexico is one of the principal centres of child sex tourism, it adds.
