From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Tue Nov 10 2009 - 02:50:15 EST
Defending African Children From Western Sexual Predators
African children are victims of pedophiles from Europe and the U.S. posing
as "tourists"
By Samuel Olara
November 8th, 2009
[Global: Africa]
Like many holiday destinations, East Africa’s pristine shorelines, game
reserves, abundant night life and cultural attractions are the stuff
holiday brochures in the west are made of.
Tourism is a major money spinner for many of the world’s poorest
countries, but East Africa’s tropical paradise hides a dark, sordid
secret: child sex tourism.
It is estimated that upwards of a million under-age children around the
world are living in a kind of indentured servitude and being forced to
participate in sex acts with pedophiles masquerading as tourists or NGO
workers.
The rise of this trade is shocking; and the speed of its establishment is
staggering. It can only happen under a culture of deep rooted corruption,
poverty and lack of concern for the most vulnerable in society that
prevails in East African countries, especially Uganda and Kenya.
Child sex tourism has a long history. However, the practice has developed
substantially during the last few decades. It has kept pace with
globalization of hedonist culture of consumerism; fantasies about sex with
exotic "natives"; increase in global travel, and the spread of the
Internet. Other factors include weak national law enforcement in the
developing countries, and the depth of poverty that force parents to live
off the sale and exploitation of their children to traffickers and
brothels.
According to the experts, child sex tourism has opportunistic facets and is
always premeditated. It involves tourists who do not deliberately travel to
foreign destinations for sex purposes, but while there make use of
opportunities when they arise. The other group is tourists who travel to
foreign destinations mainly and sometimes solely the purpose of engaging in
sex with juveniles.
For example, a 65 year old expatriate teacher from the United States is
facing jail time in Ghana after being arrested for abusing several African
children by exchanging sexual favors for food. Patrick Ken Larbash, is
currently in custody whilst officials investigate his child abuse
practices. His arrest followed the seizure of video recordings with up to
eight Ghanaian children performing oral sex –Felatio- on him at his house
in Adjomanikope, near Sege, in the Dangme East District.
Larbash, who was previously living in Techiman in Ghana, had relocated to
another location within the country, Adjomanikope after being forced to
flee when elders of the community suspected him of abusing other little
girls in the area. The police failed to follow his trail.
In 2006, Alexander Kilpatrick, a 56 year old father of two, was arrested in
Milton Keynes, England, and jailed for 17 counts of sex offences after
making several trips to East Africa, masquerading as an non-governmental
organization (NGO) worker, when he was actually a pedophile.
Kilpatrick made harrowing films of the abuse; publishing them on DVDs
labeled with his victims’ names, with background music set to various
Elvis Presley songs.
More recently, police in Gulu, in the war-torn northern part of Uganda,
arrested and detained Peter Kets, a Belgian "tourist" for taking and
possessing nude pictures of little girls from the area whom he lured to his
hotel room. Peter Kets was arrested on 24 October 2009.
He admitted to have travelled in and out of Gulu four times since 2006, and
for having taken nude pictures of the under-aged children. In his defense,
he claimed he did not know he was committing any crime because the girls in
the photographs were his "girlfriends."
In all these cases, Larbash, Kilpatrick, and Kets, are some of the many
white men who travel to Africa seeking to abuse children to fulfill their
sexual perversions. Whilst other expatriates make permanent bases in Africa
as NGOs, others make frequent visits with the sole purpose of grooming
minors by using their comparative wealth to entice, exploit and ultimately
abuse vulnerable Africans - often creating films of their abuse to sell and
share worldwide with other pedophiles.
The problem is that, East African countries are doing little or nothing of
note to prevent child sexual tourism. In Kenya for instance, the practice
has become part of daily life along the shores of Mombasa, the coastal
city.
It is done with the knowledge of the police who always accept bribes
–"chai"- to look the other way. African borders and immigration rules
towards white foreigners are simply too porous and permissive. Greater
scrutiny of NGOs and background checks on their foreign managers need to be
done as a condition for granting license of operations and issuing work and
entry permits.
In recent years, growing concerns about rising abuses of children has
tested the resolve of governments to implement international agreements
designed to end the exploitation of children.
The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is already the most widely
recognized of any international agreement. Concern over child labor, child
prostitution and the civil rights of children are a benchmark by which any
nation's commitment to human rights and democracy can be judged. But this
has achieved very little in places like the northern part of Uganda, with
its army of "lost children" and whose survivors of wars and conscriptions
continue to face sexual exploitation by those who purport to help them
cope.
As experiences have shown from DR Congo, Haiti, Liberia, Sierra Leone and
Uganda, respect for children’s rights cannot be guaranteed by goodwill
alone.
The pressures of commercial development, cultural diversity and a global
economy that give easy access for a rich minority to regions where people
are struggling under appalling conditions of war, poverty and colonial
exploitation, vulnerable, powerless and voiceless group like children
become easy victims as their governments are fixated with attracting
foreign investments more than protecting their own citizens.
Tourism is the world's leading economic sector and all countries compete to
lure visitors. The problem is that in many regions of Africa, particularly
countries like Kenya and Uganda, sexual exploitation, specifically the
exploitation of children is an unpleasant by-product of tourism. Equally
the ready acceptance of "NGOs" whose credentials go unchecked is a major
contributor.
It is an issue that should involve many players - journalists and media
organizations, travel agents and tourism companies, national tourist
boards, airlines and travel services, hotels and restaurants and
entertainment providers in host countries.
Until now, there has been little co-operation between these different
players in seeking to raise awareness on the issue and in taking practical
steps to combat this form of exploitation.
The exploitation of human beings in any form, particularly sexual
exploitation of children, must never be part of the tourism industry. Any
form of child sex tourism, child sexual exploitation, should be robustly
combated and perpetrators and those who abet them penalized without
concession.
Some countries already penalize their nationals for such crimes, even when
it is committed abroad. It is an encouraging development that if adopted
and practiced worldwide, will protect the world’s vulnerable people: our
children.
Olara is a human rights advocate. olarasamuel@hotmail.com
Please post your comments directly online or submit them to
milton@blackstarnews.com
"Speaking Truth To Empower."
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