Child Prostitution: A Grown-Up Problem for Costa Rica Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit DIRECT FROM CUBA Special Moncada Edition - July 26, 2001 . *Costa Rica: Child Prostitution - A Grown-Up Problem by Sunia Santisteban Havana, July 26 (PL)--Anguish and impotence are written in the eyes of Juana, a 14-year-old Costa Rican child, who nine months ago began in the prostitution business. She sells her body for $15 to buy crack and a ration of food. Child prostitution in that Central American nation, studied and published in a study entitled "Sex Exploitation in Costa Rica" is an old and serious social tumor. The country has become a pedophiliac paradise, but Costa Rican President Miguel Angel Rodriguez has attempted recently to strengthen punishements for those who commit violations against minors (under 18 years old) and against pimps. Psychologists believe that the marketing of children and adolescents not only affects them physically, but morally damages them and interferes with their complete development. The investigation revealed that among 3,500,000 Costa Ricans, more than 140,000 children are street workers, a very alarming figure. Most children who sell their bodies are abused at home and live in poverty, research by humanitarian organizations shows. Almost 55% of children interviewed said they wanted to die, 60% have abandoned their studies, 50% do not know their biological father, 60% suffer from family violence and 80% were victims of sexual abuse before the age of 12. The obvious conclusions of the study are that this serious social problem is due to corrupt, violent, exploitative adults, and a concomitant lack of severe legal penalties for offenders, as well as poverty, inequality and defenselessness accented by Neoliberal Globalization. Bruce Harris, director of Alliance House, a non-profit organization that tracks child development in Central America, cited International Labor Organization statistics to the effect that of 250 million children working in the world, 30 million live in Latin America and the Caribbean. He indicated that child exploitation can considered a "contemporary form of slavery" and exhorted the United States to strengthen monitoring, prosecution and punishment of those who, protected by their positions, are accomplices to child smuggling and prostitution. Harris explained that the recent restrictions and operations against sex tourism in Thailand, Sri Lanka and other Asian countries has caused an increasing exodus of pedophiles to Latin America. "The Washington Post" says that in Costa Rica, child prostitution is increasing overwhelmingly and it is likely the regional country where the problem is most poignant. Costa Rica's Institute of Tourism (ICT) has announced a strong, new campaign against this kind of tourism in Costa Rica, because it has become a target for pedophiles and pederasts. Guillermo Castro, of ICT, told La Nacion daily that travel agencies and web pages are openly promoting the former "Switzerland of the Americas" as a sex destination. Some hotels in the capital and at the major beaches have become centers of operations for youngsters looking contacts with tourists, he said. Ruben Pacheco, president of the National Chamber of Tourism pointed out that meetings are planned with government officials and deputies to strengthen laws against this kind of crime. The Convention on the Rights of Children, signed in 1989, obliges governments to protect children from economic exploitation and from "doing any dangerous work that might interfere with the child's education or be pernicious to his/her physical or mental health as well as his/her social development." The World Congress against Sex Trade and Exploitation of Children, held in Stockholm, Sweden has forcefully deplored the sexual use of minors. "To encourage, deceive or force them to pose for photos or participate in pornographic videos is degradable; it implies an insult to his/her dignity and self esteem," the meeting's final declaration reads. The American Psychiatric Association's diagnostic manual of mental disorders (DSM-IV) defines pedophilia as a category of paraphilia, part of the category of "sex disorders and disorders of sexual identity." This category is defined as recurrent fantasies and highly exciting impulses or behaviors connected to sexual activity with minors. The manual indicates that such ideas cause a person's social, work and moral deterioration. Whether or not it is a biological disorder, it is an international crime, and those who commit such a abasing activity must serve severe sentences. Costa Rica entered a tourism boom at the beginning of the 1990's, and mainly exploits its natural resources, national parks (covering 24% of its territory or 51,100 square km), rain forests, volcanoes and beaches on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Set amid this breathtaking beauty and endless ecological potential for legal profits, the unscrupulous evil of ruining the mental and physical health, and even the lives, of the country's new generations is particularly offensive. GCP/SUN/CCS (c) 2001 Prensa Latina, NY Transfer News. All rights reserved. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytcamer-07.26.01-20:55:33-32691