stepping stones program

Transcription

STEPPING STONES PROGRAM
INVESTIGATION
BUILDING BRIDGES TO COMBAT
COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND
TRAFFICKING OF CHILDREN AND
ADOLESCENTS
BOLIVIA - BRASIL COLOMBIA - PARAGUAY - PERÚ
1
BOLIVIA
INVESTIGATION
DIAGNOSIS OF NEEDS OF ADOLESCENT AND
YOUNG WOMEN LIVING IN SITUATIONS OF
COMMERCIAL SEXUAL VIOLENCE IN THE CITY
OF EL ALTO
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
La Paz - Bolivia
2015
ICCO Cooperation / AIDS FONDS: STEPPING STONES PROGRAM
South American coordination
Ximena Machicao Barbery
María Crespo Arauco
Authors
BOLIVIA - EL ALTO
Fundación La Paz
Researcher
Lola Gutiérrez León
Revision and follow-up
Jorge Domic Ruiz
Jully Calle Machicao
Support
Jisk’a Pankarita Program Technical Team
Final editing and translation:
Pedro Albornoz
General Mapping
Alfonso Hinojosa G.
Germán Guaygua Ch.
Specific Mapping
Alfonso Hinojosa G.
Ariel Ramírez Q.
Reyna Victoria Cachi Salamanca
Ana Carla Llanco Aguirre
Elizabeth D. Velasco Guachalla
In charge of follow-up
Jorge Domic Ruiz
Jully Calle Machicao
Support
Jisk’a Pankarita Program Technical Team
Jully Velma Calle Machicao
Palmira Carvajal Vásquez
Jorge Luis Evangelista Calderón
Jhamilka Nadya Gutiérrez Aguilera
David Ricardo Velasco Guachalla
Editing and revision
Alfonso Hinojosa
Final editing and design
Sucel Comunicadores Asociados S.R.L.
El Alto, La Paz – Bolivia
2015
3
BRASIL
Authors
Centro Humanitário de Apoio à Mulher - CHAME
Researchers
Maria Jaqueline de Souza Leite
Ana Montiaga García
Louraine Carvalho de Melo Gomes
Editing and translation
Ana Montiaga García
Salvador-Bahia -Brazil
2015
COLOMBIA
Authors
FUNDACION RENACER
Director
Luz Stella Cárdenas Ovalle
Administrative Subdirector
Marta Cárdenas
Subdirector of Prevention
Zared Sibelly Garzón
Research team
Luz Stella Cárdenas
Marta Isabel Orozco
Kiffany De los Reyes
Bibiana Etayo
Elkyn Castaño
Job Arrieta
Leandro Quiroz
Methodological Support
Anika Quiñones
Copywriting
Nelson E. Rivera
Zared Garzón
Anika Quiñones
Bogotá- Colombia
2015
4
PARAGUAY
In charge of the study
Luis Caputo (BASE-IS)
Technical Team
Regina Bachero (GLN)
Raquel Fernández (GLN)
Marielle Palau (BASE-IS)
Interviewers
Zunilda Barrios
Luis Caputo
Proofreading
Margarita Palau Jaquelina Ortega
Asunción-Paraguay
2015
PERÚ
Author
Capital Humano y Social Alternativo
Research team
Ana María Rosasco Dulanto
Alejandro Amadeo Lazarte Belapatiño
Technical support and revision
Andrea Querol Lipcovich (President of CHS Alternativo)
Alicia Solari Caetano (Coordinator of PSS-Peru)
Lima-Peru
2015
ICCO Cooperation / AIDS FONDS: Stepping Stones – “Building bridges in the fight
against commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents”
5
INDEX
1. Introduction
2.
Context of the Study
3.
Analytical framework and methodology
4.
Main conclusions
5.
Guideline recommendations
6
INVESTIGATION
DIAGNOSIS OF NEEDS OF ADOLESCENT AND YOUNG WOMEN
LIVING IN SITUATIONS OF COMMERCIAL SEXUAL VIOLENCE IN
THE CITY OF EL ALTO
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1.
Introduction
Commercial sexual violence is a phenomenon that involves commercial sexual exploitation of
the bodies of children and adolescents, a violation of their human rights. It is a profit-oriented
illegal activity that follows a set of social, patriarchal, male centered, colonial and adult-centric practices that are specific to a culture of violence and abuse of power.
Bolivia, unlike what is currently stated in the international legal framework, has addressed the
issue conceptually and legally with more depth than other countries and defined the crime of
commercial sexual violence against young girls, children and adolescents, and has identified
the active subject of the crime: the sexual aggressor, or ‘john’, mistakenly called client.
In the frame of the Stepping Stones Program: Building bridges in the fight against commercial
sexual exploitation and trafficking of minors in Bolivia 2014-2015, Fundacion La Paz, together
with funding provided by ICCO Cooperation and Aids Fonds, presents this diagnosis of human
needs among adolescent and young women living in situations of sexual in the city of El Alto,
a study attempting to shed light on how these needs are organized, what is their order of
importance and which are the most common satisfactors to fulfill them.
This diagnosis document is divided in six chapters. The first one is the theoretical framework
analyzing, on one hand, the theories on human needs and satisfactors and, on the other
hand, the conceptual insights surrounding commercial sexual violence. Chapter two contextualizes the issue in the city Of El Alto. The third chapter refers to the methodological framework, and details the design, approach used for analysis, validation process, the work groups
and techniques used to gather information, as well as the process of systematization and
final draft. The fourth chapter is the diagnosis of needs and satisfactors per se; this section
is organized according to the four population groups we worked with (population at risk, in
situation of commercial sexual violence, in process of recovery and in post-facto stage). After
each sub-chapter, we classify the satisfactors and their incidence in the way of life of the adolescents. In the fifth chapter, we detail the conclusions and, in the final chapter, we propose
the action guidelines to enhance educational processes aimed at providing prevention and
attention.
7
Context of the study
The situation of violence endured by children and adolescents in Bolivia is alarming. Approximately 83% of children and adolescents suffer violence in their own homes or schools. Over
one million children and adolescents were physically punished at least once, and approximately 3.000 children and adolescents are homeless while thousands of others are victims of
commercial sexual violence, human trafficking and smuggling. Commercial sexual violence
against children and adolescents is a phenomenon that grows daily in the country. Though
we lack official numbers regarding the victims, a research carried out in the cities of La Paz,
El Alto, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz found that 1,453 boys, girls and teenagers between 11
and 17 years were victims of this crime.
The diagnosis was carried out in the city of El Alto, a young city (33 years) that, however,
has a population of approximately one million inhabitants. El Alto is the second most populated city in the country and is composed of immigrants, especially from Andean rural areas,
who make up an intercultural and multilingual territory. This dizzying growth has generated
a deficient coverage of basic services, social services as well as formal and qualified job opportunities.
El Alto is one of the cities with largest number of homeless children and adolescents. Out of
the 3,000 children and adolescents living in the streets, 40% are in this city and are in the
age range of 10 to 19 years. According to data from the Office for the Defense of Children
and Adolescents of El Alto, in 2012, over 14,000 cases of violence against children and adolescence were reported.
Children begin suffering from homelessness at different ages: boys at seven, and girls at
eleven. Among the main factors leading to this situation are domestic violence, disintegration
of the nuclear family and poverty. Most homeless children sleep in improvised housing, like
make-shift motels known as ‘telos’, but also in ATMs, squares and parks. Some of their survival strategies include vending, shoe shining and theft. Women also resort to ‘working rooms’,
which means they make an agreement with their sexual aggressor (‘customer’ or ‘john’) to
have sexual intercourse in the many hostels in this city.
When an adolescent girl runs away from her home and starts living on the street, she is generally contacted by older adolescent girls who, for two to three weeks, help her out with food,
clothing and shelter. At the end of this period, they initiate her into the practice of using inhalants, such as glue or paint thinner, to “get high”. Sometimes they are taken to “work rooms”
to pay for their expenses and, at other times, male teenagers pretend to offer them protection
and affection, acting like boyfriends, in order to exploit them and make a profit out of their
bodies. In both these cases, teenage boys and girls turn into the procurers of the new girls.
Out of the money a teenage girl charges for “working rooms”, generally more than half (60%)
goes to the owner of the brothel or bar. They can make extra money if they “agree” to have
intercourse without condoms or perform extra services. Another risk faced by homeless young
and adolescent girls who endure the dynamics of commercial sexual violence is that they can
become HIV/AIDS positive.
Some of the main places where young and adolescent girls become victims of commercial
sexual violence in the city of El Alto are: the area around Avenida 12 de Octubre avenue, Calle
Franco Valle street, the surroundings of Plaza Juana Azurduy and Villa Adela. All the areas of
El Alto are currently filled with hostels. Within a diameter less than 500 square meters, one
8
can find over 60 hostels illegally operating as motels and even as brothels offering service
in “combos” (bars, inns, nightclubs and “girls”). It is estimated that over 60% of the hostels
have no kind of registry or license of operation or health license.
The number of brothels has increased in such a way that it is very difficult to control them.
Many are night clubs, with restaurant and bars, and serve as fronts for brothels hidden in
the back. The latter have rooms arranged with screens or very small places that can barely
house a bed; these rooms lack even the minimum requirements for health and frequently the
bathrooms are shared with the nightclub, the restaurant and the bar.
The city of El Alto has different government institutions working for the defense and protection of the human rights of and, such as Offices for the Defense of Children and Adolescents,
the Unit to Provide Attention to Victims and Witnesses for the Attorney’s Office, the Special
Police Task Force to Fight Violence, as well as the Office against Human Trafficking and Smuggling. However, these institutions are barely equipped in terms of physical infrastructure,
staff, economic resources and equipment, thus, their proper operation is not ensured.
There are also many non-government and social organizations promoting the protection of
rights for children and adolescents, building on programs to provide attention, such as daycare centers and homes for girls and adolescents living in situations of violence and commercial sexual violence, as well as social-educational spaces, institutions for psycho-affective
recovery and job training for social reinsertion.
Methodology
The methodology used is qualitative, since it places emphasis in studying socially constructed
processes. The subjective dimension is highlighted because the methodology used aims at
trying to get to know how adolescent and young girls living in situations of commercial sexual
violence in the city of El Alto live, feel and satisfy their human needs.
The focus of the analysis starts by taking understanding violence as being actually a chain of
violence. Thus, the situation of commercial sexual violence in which young and adolescent
women is not a part of an isolated fact, but rather a set of conditions (structural and conjunctural) and deriving from preexisting violent relations. Further, five approaches were used: the
human rights approach, the approach for protection of the rights of children and adolescents,
the gender approach, the approach for sexual rights and reproductive rights, and the territorial approach.
The theoretical and methodological frameworks proposed by Max-Neef, since this author considers human needs, as wants, basically individual and collective potentials. However, satisfactors are ways of being, of having, of doing and existing. Thus, what is culturally determined
are not just fundamental human needs but also the satisfactors of those needs. Every society, with its specific political, economic, social and cultural systems, will establish the styles
required to satisfy human needs. In this case, the conditions of gender and age will also
determine the type of satisfactors.
Human needs can be detailed according to multiple and diverse criteria and the author proposes a combination of two criteria: according to existential categories and according to
axiological categories. For this study, the existential categories include being, having, doing,
existing and feeling (this last category was proposed by Fundacion La Paz). In their turn, the
axiological categories refer to: survival, protection, affection, understanding, participation,
identity and freedom.
9
Due to the nature of the study and the conjunctural conditions, we worked with nineteen
young and adolescent girls between 13 and 22 years of age. We divided this group in four: (i)
population at risk (ii) population living in situations of commercial sexual violence, (iii) population in process of recovering from commercial sexual violence and (iv) Post-facto stage.
All are related to the social-educational work carried out by Fundacion Munasim Kullaquita
(Quierete Hermanita), in the city of El Alto.
During the two weeks previous to our field work, we accompanied the team of educators from
Fundacion Munasim Kullaquita (Quierete Hermanita) to their street work at night; we visited the Centro Escucha Comunitario center and the home to get to know the adolescent and
young girls and, thus to build spaces of trust.
To fill out the matrix of needs, we used four techniques to collect data: (i) semi-structured
individual and group interviews, (ii) inductive forms, (ii) life-stories, (iii) participative observation based on field journal and (iv) revision of secondary sources.
The interpretation of the data collected in field work underwent content analysis considering
the axiological and existential categories. Thus, the most important phrases were identified
for each existential category (seeing, having, doing, existing and feeling), differentiated per
work groups to guide the reflection process. We took into account the words and interpretations belonging to the young and adolescent girls to understand building on their own subjectivity, discourse and the place where they stand and narrate their lives.
Main conclusions
The living conditions of the young and adolescent women predetermine, overdetermine and
limit the ways they satisfy their human needs, especially when considering their immediate
requirements for survival and their need for protection, affection and identity. Overdetermination has to do with situations such as: poverty and marginality faced by their families; the
dissolution of their family unit and the absence of responsible parenting; the excessive consumption of alcohol within the family and society; the lack of opportunities for adolescents
and youngsters, especially girls; society seeing violence as a natural part of life, especially
violence against young girls and adolescents; the patriarchal system that undervalues women
and objectifies their bodies.
For adolescent women, commercial sexual violence is or was just another situation in the
chain of violence they endure in their lives. Commercial sexual violence is a crime that is part
of the inhuman and violent context they face, since they are homeless, consume inhalant
drugs and alcoholic beverages and generally lack protection from their families. The social
rejection adolescent women suffer is expressed as humiliation, discrimination and abuse not
just from society but also, frequently, from their own families. This situation places them in
a position of great social exclusion.
Though the presence of the trafficker is not evident in all the cases, the presence of the sexual
predator is noticeable. Their life-stories demonstrate that traffickers have not played out the
traditional, masculine ideal that is external to their lives since, for one of them, the trafficker/
procurer was her own mother; for other girls, their own partners and peers from the street
assumed this role and sometimes they have acted as traffickers with other adolescents; thus,
they were victims and “aggressors” at the same time.
For the group of adolescents living in risk, responsibility, self-esteem and having a personality are considered synergic satisfactors. This implies they satisfy a need and, at the
10
same time, motivate the satisfaction of others. The trust towards parents is, at the same
time, both an inhibiting and synergic satisfactor. On one hand, living in an adult-centered
patriarchal world completely invalidates the opinion of girls and adolescents. And this is compounded by the naturalization of these adult-centric, violent behaviors. On the other hand,
and in the sphere of love, education, affection and the existence of communication that runs
both ways and respectful towards parents, the voices of adults can be a referent and example
to follow, as well as a protective element.
For these girls, the presence of the family/the home is evident. Their families provide them
with affection, care and protection. The girls acknowledge the value of having the trust of
their parents and they feel appreciated and valued by them, and also the value of their homes
as spaces of security and affection. In contrast, the street is a place that is unsafe, dangerous
and fearful.
The most important needs for this group are learning and liberty. These two elements are
linked by their responsibility as daughters/adolescents to study so, later, they will have an
occupation and will be able to work on their own (become independent). Being irresponsible
could affect their own freedom; thus, they believe it is important to decide what kind of life
they want to live.
For adolescent and young girls who live in commercial sexual violence, the most important needs are: survival, identity, protection and affection. These needs demonstrate that
the situation of commercial sexual violence, being homeless and consuming inhalants are
“satisfactors” that allow fulfilling needs of survival and protection. This is why they acknowledge that temptation is strong and that they lack courage and external support to leave this
type of life behind. Knowing they “are not as brave as they need to be” as one of the reasons
they have not been able to leave the street reflects their low self-esteem and reveals they
have a very strong sense of frustration.
They identify the following as synergic satisfactors: being heard, understood and supported.
These requirements, so basic and human in the life of every person, are a desperate cry for
help, since frequently they are non-existent. Thus, feeling they are heard, understood and
supported would help to improve not only the conditions for their protection but also their
survival.
The living conditions of this group is characterized by the prevalence of all forms of violence,
ranging from the most structural forms of violence, such as poverty, up until the most symbolic forms of violence, such as discrimination and knowing themselves as being “prisoners”
of drugs. These forms of violence annul and destroy their condition as people.
The street is an ambiguous place because, though it gives them freedom, it also takes it away
from them. It is a place that protects them and at the same time leaves them vulnerable. Alcohol and inhalants generate immediate states, situations, experiences and sensations of “wellbeing” but only within a context of neglect and vulnerability that is even greater than the former.
For adolescent and young girls living in commercial sexual violence, the most important needs are survival, protection, identity and freedom. This shows that, to the girls, the
will to live and to be protected are fundamental. This is also true of their need to rebuild their
identity and be free.
They stated that responsibility, studying and working will ensure their survival, learning and
their own freedom. These satisfactors demonstrate, on one side, their resiliency and, on the
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other, that they are in the process of recovering and that they have assumed their own responsibilities to overcome their living conditions. This shows that, to the girls, the will to live
and to be protected are fundamental. This is also true of their need to rebuild their identity
and be free.
They identified as synergic satisfactors: being with their family and children, change (of
their way of thinking and attitudes), listening and obeying. Also, they frequently stated they
needed to be well with themselves, valuing and respecting themselves. These satisfactors
highlight the process or emotional, affective and occupational recovery (in a certain sense)
required for them to overcome the situations of extreme violence they have been exposed to.
The place of protection, nurturing they expect to have once they leave the foster home is as
yet “unknown” to them and they yet have to build it.
For the post-facto population, the most important needs are: identity, affection, participation, learning and freedom. The value placed on identity has a specific sense because it
allows them to reconstruct their own individuality. And, according to these girls, this process
requires affection and participation. This context evidences the perspective with which they
see their past life, the life they are building and the one they want to build in the future.
For these girls, respect, comprehension and being heard are synergic satisfactors that ensure
the needs for identity, participation and freedom as well as those for survival and affection.
This means that these wants are fundamental in their daily lives. When they talk about respect, they mean not only as reciprocated by others but also as self-respect; thus, their own
opinions and way of being would be respected. They have internalized responsibility as a
value, a quality and an attitude to face life in order to ensure self-control and move forward.
The place where they feel protected is place as yet idea, because it still must be built, but in
the future. In other words, the place where they will feel well, happy and protected still does
not exist.
There is a learning curve because they are able to acknowledge this ability to learn and know
they are resilient. Now they are peer educators at the Centro Escucha institution, and are
aware that their life stories can help and influence the lives of other girls who are homeless
or living in commercial sexual violence.
In summary, each of the groups of adolescents express diverse needs and it is evident that
the living conditions they currently have condition the ways in which they satisfy their human
needs.
Further, for the group of adolescent and young women living in situations of risk, their most
important needs are learning and freedom. These two elements are linked by their responsibility as daughters/adolescents to study so, later, they will have an occupation and will be able
to work on their own and become independent. For those living in situations of commercial
sexual violence, the most important needs are: survival, identity, protection and affection.
These needs demonstrate that the situation of commercial sexual violence, being homeless
and consuming inhalants are “satisfactors” that allow fulfilling needs of survival and protection. Similar needs are deemed important in adolescents in the process of recovering from
commercial sexual violence, for whom the most important needs are: survival, protection
and freedom. They stated that responsibility, studying and working will ensure their survival,
learning and their own freedom. In contrast to identity, participation and learning, the needs
expressed by the post facto population are: Identity, affection, participation, learning and
freedom. The value placed on identity has a specific sense because it allows them to recon12
struct their own individuality. For these girls, respect, comprehension and being heard are
fundamental to rebuild themselves and their own lives.
Guideline recommendations
To be more strategic, the guideline recommendations propose a working approach or “effective practices” as approaches that have demonstrated to be successful in countries within the
region and/or the world. These successful experiences have been registered by civil society
organizations, by government programs as well as experiences from international cooperation. When thinking of specific strategies, it is important not to lose sight of the cultural,
social and economic components of Bolivia.
These guideline recommendations have been adapted for prevention and care of adolescent
and young girls who live in situations of commercial sexual violence and trafficking, from a
human rights approach. By prevention, one must understand the situation preceding the
violation of their rights; by attention, on the other hand, the situation after or during the violation of their rights.
Prevention
•Prevention approach – proposes three types of policies:
Central Policies. These policies are composed of three programs:
Policies and/or programs for comprehensive child development – programs related
to social policies aimed at social inclusion to help families living in situations of
greatest social exclusion to promote among the latter guidelines for nurturing and
education, within an environment full of love and affection, effective communication, and to promote respect and gender equality.
Policies and/or specific programs with girls and boys – programs that will ensure the exercise of the rights of children as subjects possessing rights, aiming
at deconstructing (since childhood) patriarchal adult-centric relations and male.
These programs are fundamentally related to rights to education and development, health and nutrition, protection and justice.
Programs with families – these programs would help those families living in situations of greatest social vulnerability, to improve their living conditions in matters
related to establishing good relations when dealing with their couples and children,
to work and dignified employment, access to suitable housing with proper facilities, access to basic services (water, light, public transportation, communication,
green and recreational areas, among others).
Promising policies. These policies are composed of three programs:
Educational programs – aimed at working with children, adolescents and young
people, in order to improve and provide a constructive, quality education promoting values and principles of human rights and democracy, formal education program and alternative education.
Job training programs – focused especially towards adolescents and young people
living in situations of greatest social vulnerability. This type of program should en13
sure quality training as well as job opportunities together with this training.
Recreational and/or cultural programs – aimed at children, adolescents and young
people, in order to promote and enhance their capacities and skills for sports, art
and culture, as well as promoting participation and leadership as strategies to
achieve social acknowledgement.
General policies These are composed of three programs:
Programs for adolescents in conflict with the law – related with work carried out
with men and adolescent women in conflict with the law, based on an approach of
human rights and within the framework of restorative justice.
Community police programs – programs to promote practices ensuring proper
treatment and respect towards human rights between the police force and the
population. These are initiatives to bring together the citizenry, i.e., civil society
and the institution in charge of safeguarding the protection of rights and social
order, an order that must be inclusive, be open to human diversity instead of generating social stigma.
Safe neighborhood programs – these programs would help improve living conditions of families in marginal neighborhoods or who suffer from social margination
by providing them access to basic services, improving public spaces, improving
the conditions of safety and social control of violence effected by neighborhood
watches.
• Change of social norms and individual behaviors:
Changes in social norms – This is related to strategies contributing towards a change
of behaviors governed by socially and historically naturalized habits, such as: Violent
social/collective, patriarchal, male-chauvinistic behaviors that undermine the value
of girls, adolescent girls and women; adult-centric social/collective behaviors; social/
collective behaviors discriminating children, adolescents and young people living in the
streets, among others.
Changes in individual behaviors – Central, promising and general policies, as well
as strategies related to the change of social norms will enable transforming individual
behaviors by ensuring these are based on proper treatment of others, respecting the
opinion of children and adolescents and on non-discrimination.
• Regulation-based approach – This approach intends to work to prevent the demand for
bodies of girls, adolescent girls and women, in other words, to regulate the behavior of sexual
aggressors. Three areas are proposed:
Legal regulation: This refers to the existence of a legal framework to protect girls,
adolescent girls, young girls and women from all types of violence, especially commercial sexual violence. Further, it must punish behaviors that contradict these legal
norms. This means that there must be legal punishment as well as the regulation of
behavior in people’s daily lives.
Self-regulation: This relates to the way norms and values are lived in the frame of
every person’s ethics and morale (moral conscience). Whoever does not abide by their
own self-regulation may feel guilt or remorse.
14
Sociocultural regulation: This is related with social control and punishment as well
as acknowledgement, trust and reputation, for example, when society punishes or
does not tolerate situations of violence. Not complying with this regulation may bring
fear to social rejection, loss of prestige or civil death.
• ECO 2 approach:
Model of social interaction where the community becomes the therapeutic space when
there is social suffering. The community is considered a system of networks building
and animating a territory, and it is the product of a network of social actors. It is an
ethnographic model for active participation in society.
Prevention is the organization of networks with the community.
There are five axes around which this work would be organized: Prevention – organization; basic assistance; formal and informal education; medical and psychological
cure; occupation and work.
Attention
• Social inclusion approach:
Working with those in a situation of greatest social exclusion, in this case, with adolescent and young women living in situations of commercial sexual violence, as well as
with adolescent and young women who live on the streets. For this, it is necessary to
work on securing social cohesion, increasing the access to opportunities and the exercise to rights regarding basic conditions for survival, protection and affection.
• Ecological model – This model proposes to work in four dimensions:
Individual dimensions: This has to do with the most personal and intimate space,
such as one’s body.
Relational dimensions: This has to do with the first spaces of socialization and
learning, such as family and school, relation with peers and friends.
Community dimensions: This has to do with social, community, cultural and symbolic structures where people are found, as well as technologies or codes of communication, such as: neighborhoods, cities, television, internet, music, etc.
Social dimensions: Set of cultural schemes and values where the other systems
reside.
• Public health approach – This intends to work in three levels:
Primary level: With the general population.
Secondary level: With populations in situations of risk (young girls, adolescents and
young girls).
Tertiary level: With populations living in situations of commercial sexual violence.
Quaternary level1: With population in the process of emotional, affective, social and
occupational recovery after suffering situations of commercial sexual violence, when
1
El equipo investigador incluye esta cuarta categoría al enfoque de salud pública.
15
possible to: (i) heal the pain and mourn the human losses in the lives of victims; (ii)
re-signify life experiences; (iii) enhance adolescent girl`s capacity for resiliency (iv)
build a life-project with them.
• The methodology of Program Oqharikuna2:
This methodology sets two work strategies: An intensive and an extensive line. The first one
is executed within the program and the second with the community.
The methodology has three axes for action: (i) axis of resiliency (biophysical development,
social-affective development and sociocultural development); (ii) axis of protagonism (intensive line – self regulation and extensive – work with the community); and (iii) training axis
(job training and working and recovery of knowledge).
• An approach of work as a meaning for living:
Building on the experiences of prevention and fight against violence towards women, we determined one of the fundamental axes is work, for it is seen as an element that enables financial autonomy, social and affective independence, the reconstruction of an identity and social
reinsertion. We believe that work not only allows improving opportunities in live but it also
generates a meaning for life. For adolescent and young women who have lived in situations
of commercial sexual violence, work can become an anchor to generate better opportunities
and these new meanings of live. This approach should ensure not only job opportunities but
also help to build, together with the girls and women involved, their life project, and should
provide them with support and accompany them socially, therapeutically, emotionally and
daily during this process where they would learn while doing.
Some of the components of this approach would include the following: processes of individual
and collective alternative theoretical and practical training; strategies to learn while doing;
strategies to help them with sustenance as teenage mothers; strategies to provide them with
daily support; strategies for emotional and affective recovery, health strategies and occupational health, among others.
La Paz-Bolivia, Octuber, 2015
2
Sea: Fundacion La Paz (2005), Lo que soñamos juntos está bigote. Programa Oqharikuna. Fundacion La Paz. La Paz.
16
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Boltvinik, Julio, La teoría de las necesidades humanas de Doyal y Gough. En Comercio Exterior. Vol 53. Num. 5. Mayo 2013. http://revistas.bancomext.gob.mx/rce/magazines/20/2/
RCE2.pdf
Fundación La Paz (2007), Para transformar este mundo sórdido. Sistematización de la experiencia socioeducativa de trabajo con niños, niñas y adolescentes en situación de violencia
sexual comercial. Fundación La Paz – Programa Jiska Pankarita. La Paz.
Fundación La Paz (2005), Lo que soñamos juntos está bigote. Programa Oqharikuna. Fundación La Paz. La Paz.
Heller, Agner (1977), Sociología de la Vida Cotidiana. Barcelona: Península.
ICCO Cooperación y SOAIDS – Programa Steeping StoneS (2015), Estudio comparativo. Procesos de políticas, planes y leyes nacionales sobre violencia sexual comercial y trata de niñas,
niños y adolescentes en cinco países de Sudamérica. (Documento PDF)
Maslow, Abraham (1998), El hombre auto realizado: Hacia una psicología del ser. Barcelona:
Kairós.
Max Neef, Manfred (1998), Desarrollo a Escala Humana. Conceptos, aplicaciones y algunas
reflexiones. Icaria. Barcelona.
Real Academia Española (1992), Diccionario de la lengua española. Vigésima primera edición
Tomo II. Madrid.
UNICEF, OIT-IPEC, Ministerio de Trabajo (2004), La niñez clausurada. La violencia sexual
comercial contra niñas, niños y adolescentes en Bolivia.
Zabala Tórres, Elizabeth (2012), Diagnóstico sobre la violencia sexual comercial en Bolivia.
La Paz, con el apoyo de ICCO Cooperación Sudamérica y Conexión Fondo de Emancipación.
17
Páginas web consultadas
http://iccosudamerica.org/proyectos/vuela-libre
http://www.endaelalto.org/nuestro-trabajo/programas-de-desarrollo/comunidad-terapeutica-casa-fraternidad/
http://www.ilo.org/americas/sala-de-prensa/WCMS_LIM_653_SP/lang--es/index.htm
http://www.ilo.org/americas/sala-de-prensa/WCMS_LIM_653_SP/lang--es/index.htm
http://www.knhbolivia.org/node/106
http://www.observatoriomemoria.unq.edu.ar/publicaciones/entrevista.pdf
18
BOLIVIA
INVESTIGATION
CRITICAL ROUTES FOR TRAFFICKING OF
CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS LIVING IN
SITUATIONS OF COMMERCIAL SEXUAL VIOLENCE IN THE CITY OF EL ALTO
MAPPING SEXUAL COMMERCE IN EL ALTO
ECONOMIC, SOCIAL, CULTURAL DYNAMICS
AND SPECIFIC MAPPING OF TRAFFICKING
ROUTES
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
La Paz- Bolivia
2015
Index
1. Introduction
2. Context of the Study
3. Analytical framework and methodology
4. Main findings
5. Recommendations
6.
Main elements to be considered when drawing conclusions
20
INVESTIGATION
CRITICAL ROUTES FOR TRAFFICKING OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS LIVING IN SITUATIONS OF COMMERCIAL SEXUAL VIOLENCE IN THE CITY OF EL ALTO
MAPPING SEXUAL COMMERCE IN EL ALTO
ECONOMIC, SOCIAL, CULTURAL DYNAMICS AND SPECIFIC MAPPING OF TRAFFICKING ROUTES
Executive Summary
1. Introduction
Much data gathered from research and studies demonstrate that Bolivia is one of the five
countries in South America with the largest number of cases of human trafficking and smuggling. When a child or adolescent woman is a victim of trafficking, this results in serious
physical and mental consequences compounded by social stigma that, frequently, hinders
the proper restoration of the victim’s rights. These situations in our context are made more
complex when considering the exercise of rights of children and adolescents, and go beyond
what the judicial and legal domains, spheres characterized by very frequent delays in criminal
justice, since judges, attorneys and police investigators do not hasten these cases. This leads,
only too regularly, to children and adolescents becoming victims once more.
All these legal issues promote skepticism among victims in regards to the efficacy of legislation to address this crime. In turn, this results in factors contributing towards the vulnerability of victims. This reveals the institutional weaknesses of all the organisms that should
intervene to protect children and adolescents at the national, regional and local levels.
The issue of sexual commerce, with all its variants and current derivations, in a city as complex as El Alto, needs to start by considering a series of analytical elements revealing the
diverse dynamics operating there. It is also clear to us that, due to the complexity of El Alto,
the definitions and nomenclatures we have developed in this section are just descriptors and
tools used to think on the issue in order to approach the intricate circumstances in which
many children and adolescents live.
2. Context the study was carried out
Since the city of El Alto has rapidly turned into the second most populated city in Bolivia, it
exhibits needs of an economic, social and political order resulting, in the past decades, in
increasing and worrisome levels of citizen insecurity, as shown by diverse official and private
data, demonstrated throughout this document. In any case, El Alto is a very unique city due
to its specific historic, demographic, cultural, economic, social and political traits. As a matter
21
of fact, it is the youngest, poorest, most complex city in Bolivia; further, its needs are always
considered last. It is also, according to statistics, the most dangerous and most violent one in
the country. At the national level, in terms of social urban violence, it ranks in second place
after the city of Santa Cruz and, in regards to domestic violence, it ranks in first place.
Traditional and modern stances and imaginaries coexist in El Alto; impoverished populations interact with new emerging elites even when they both share the same ethnic origins,
Aymara. This identity structures their social and cultural practices. The data demonstrates
the correspondence between poverty and ethnicity has imprinted itself on processes of economic, social and symbolic injustice. The population of El Alto is characterized by a strong
association between ethnicity and poverty.
Nonetheless, El Alto maintains a very high demographic-spatial growth, a rate considered
normal, due to the amount of young inhabitants in this municipality. But this must be considered together with the rate of unemployment and precarious nature of employment for young
men and women from El Alto, structural problems resulting in scarce job opportunities. It
has been evident from a while back that, in spite of the favorable changes in the economy,
this has not necessarily resulted in an improvement in the job market for these young men
and women. One statistic illustrating this is the rate of unemployment among young people
which, for over two decades now, is twice as large as the general average.
In this context, the families of El Alto find themselves requiring developing a series of strategies
to sustain themselves. Thus, not only do both parents work long hours outside of their homes,
but their sons and daughters must assume responsibilities at a very young age. So, children
and adolescents of both sexes enter the job market at an early age. In this context, girls and
young women are the most vulnerable populations targeted by crimes such as commercial sexual violence and human trafficking.
We can find a diversity of cultural tastes and consumption trends that translate into multiple
identities. Thus, a new style of life among the young people of El Alto, a city where sexual
commerce is very present. New identities have been shaped by designer and foreign clothes,
even if these are second-hand; further, eating habits value fast food as a sign of distinction;
also, the dream of owning a house has given way to a desire for comfort and possession of
electronic appliances aimed at leisurely activities.
Thus, this research and all its stages, executed in coordination with Fundacion La Paz, has
stated as its central objective the mapping of economic, social and cultural dynamics found in
the city of El Alto in relation to sexual commerce, human trafficking and commercial sexual
violence. Thus, it would be possible to obtain a three-dimensional picture of the issue and to
identify routes and levels of judicial action addressing these crimes. This objective responds
to the fact that the country has no data or research identifying routes used for the trafficking
of children and adolescents, such as mapping of areas of risk; this could allow drafting a three
dimensional panorama of certain sectors preyed upon for purposes of sexual trafficking. Thus,
this study aims at contributing to create new approaches and interpretations on commercial
sexual violence and the routes used for human trafficking in the city of El Alto. This would
allow designing actions to address this issue which especially affects children and adolescents.
3. Methodology
Methodologically, the study combined a qualitative approach, based on interviews, observation, focus groups and testimonies, with a quantitative approach, based on data and second22
ary information, to create as complete a view and establish a perspective that would allow
assessing the magnitude of this issue. Our intention was and is to maintain the true voice,
words and meaning of the actors we interacted with. This methodological approach is coherent with the central objective proposed for this study, which aims at identifying critical routes
used for trafficking of children and adolescents and, thus, to create a comprehensive picture
of Commercial Sexual Violence in the socioeconomic, intercultural and political dynamics of
the city of El Alto. The specific objectives required to identify the place of origin and modes
in which the girls were approached and describe how they were captured/transported/delivered, and the places where they were forced to work; the objectives also required creating
a three-dimensional view of the phenomenon of commercial sexual violence considering the
socioeconomic and cultural levels of origin of the adolescent women and their presence in the
different zones of the city of El Alto.
The resulting products of this study required identifying routes of internal and external trafficking (manner in which victims were captured, transported and delivered); determining an
approximate number of children and adolescents involved in the dynamics of Commercial
Sexual Violence, their family situation, social, economic (income) characteristics and educational situation of the adolescent women inhabiting the areas of high risk identified in the
study; characterization of their way of life in their situation, their relationship with their procurers and sexual aggressors (social origin) and spaces in which they carry out their activity
(daily routine); identifying cases legally filed and not filed related to minors who had been
victims of trafficking and crimes related to Commercial Sexual Violence.
4. Main findings
In general terms, the results generated by the study demonstrate the narrow relationship
and joint growth of informal urban commerce and sexual commerce in the city of El Alto. This
bond results in areas considered as high risk. We define as “areas of high risk“ those sites
where the presence of bars, call houses, street commerce, nightclubs, brothels, bus stations,
etc., constitute threats and risks for children and adolescents who coexist in those places and
who may easily fall prey to commercial sexual violence and human trafficking. The analysis
parameters of these places are framed within factors such as poverty, inequality, migration
and family dysfunctions, where one of the manifestations is the neglect and vulnerability of
children and adolescents.
Once the criteria needed to identify areas of risk were established during the initial stage
of the study, the following sites were classified as such: Ceja in El Alto, Villa Dolores, 12
de Octubre Avenue and Senkata. These areas were thus classified since they exhibit risk
factors, such as bars, brothels, hostels and call houses, in proximity to vulnerable populations: children and adolescents who become victims of sexual commerce. We identified sexual
commerce in the vicinity of these areas that is focused on this population; we found child
pornography being sold, pamphlets offering young women being distributed, sexual potency
enhancers (Viagra, Fortex, and maca) being sold openly, as well as condoms of every brand
and price in the market.
On the other hand, and due to the qualitative data generated by the field work, we were able
to identify specific terms leading to establish some routes of sexual commerce and human
trafficking, interdepartmental, national and international routes currently operating in El Alto,
in close relation with the city of La Paz. The extremely low levels of judicialization and punishment of these crimes are also covered at the end of the study, where we show, based on
official data, how the precarious nature of public institutions is an obstacle when addressing
23
these situations that affect minors and, especially, girls and adolescent women in El Alto.
This is compounded even more if we consider that in El Alto there are 30,000 identified cases
of children working in the street. Furthermore, there are many girls and adolescents who are
already victims of the dynamics of commercial sexual violence; however, there are also many
children and adolescents in situations of high risk, who constitute the most vulnerable population of a very unfavorable economic, social and cultural environment. Young girls and adolescents facing the greatest risk are those who work as street vendors, who study in schools
with groups of children and adolescents living on the street or in gangs, daughters of vending
families, of sexual workers, of parents who consume drugs or alcohol and from homeless
families or families suffering from extreme forms of domestic violence.
As a result of this research, it is possible to conclude that the city of El Alto is a space for
capturing, transporting and distributing people for purposes of sexual commerce, a scenario
where the crime of human trafficking and commercial sexual violence is highly dynamic and
enabled by internal and external routes of transportation.
There are many and varied types of settings and actors who make a profit out of brothels,
call houses and bars with links to different criminal networks trafficking in women, young and
adolescent, enabled by circuits and physical spaces where sexual commerce is carried out.
An initial evidence of these routes is the close link between El Alto and La Paz, not just in regards of the movement of sexual workers and victims of Commercial Sexual Violence, but also
regarding the customers, or “johns”, and aggressors. Furthermore, the logistics underlying
the organization and operation of the sexual industry are similar, since models are replicated,
for example, regarding the numbers of call houses, the billing and recruitment of johns, etc.
We were also able to demonstrate that in certain areas of El Alto there are actors enabling the
capture, transportation and commerce of children and adolescents for purposes of Commercial Sexual Violence.
At the departmental level, we can conclude these two cities have a strong link with the areas
of Yungas, Caranavi, Sorata, Palos Blancos, Mapiri and Desaguadero. Mining sites are highly
important, since these are destinations of sexual commerce at the departmental level. Some
national routes linked to El Alto - La Paz are Santa Cruz, Beni and, Cochabamba. It seems
these have the heaviest greatest flow of sexual commerce in the country. As for international
destinations, we have discovered two, the borders that are most connected with El Alto: Argentina, especially through Villazon, and Peru, through Desaguadero.
The results of the study also revealed the existence of 82 cases registered and filed as complaints to the Offices for the Defense of Children and Adolescents in the city of El Alto related
to human trafficking with purposes of sexual exploitation. Out of these, 6 have been elevated
to judicial spheres. Formal charges were filed and sentence was issued for a case of human
trafficking involving 3 victims. The sentences issued were 10 to 20 years of incarceration
in the jail of San Pedro. This means 2.4% of the total of complaints filed was resolved. This
reflects the weakness of the structures created to protect children and adolescents, since the
delay of criminal justice promotes impunity in crimes thus related.
5. Recommendations
Understanding the complexity and intricacy of the different circumstances around commercial
sexual violence in El Alto reflects a social phenomenon that, in a certain sense, is as new as
the city itself. However it exhibits a trend of rapid growth that follows an “entrepreneurial”
mindset. In this scenario, sexual commerce can be understood as a highly prosperous and
powerful business.
24
It is important to continue analyzing the relations existing between the different actors, with
emphasis on children and adolescents, involved in commercial economic activities in certain
areas of El Alto, such as La Ceja, Villa Dolores, 12 de Octubre Avenue, and the practice of
prostitution in its different aspects - brothels, call houses, hostels - since the reflection on this
link can lead to forms and mechanisms of social intervention and involvement.
The different critical routes used for human trafficking we discovered are used, within the city
of El Alto, as intra and interdepartmental circuits, but also connect to international destinations. This finding allows to create a more comprehensive perspective as to the role played
by this city in this delicate issue since, in many cases, the spaces used to capture, distribute
and enable consumption are very well highly connected. Thus, these routes should receive
a greater amount of attention from public planning and projects because currently there is a
marked institutional weakness that hinders proper response to the issue, at least in regards
to the judicialization of cases filed, as the collected data shows.
Further, it is important to note that much evidence points to the relationship between human
trafficking routes and mining centers, since the latter exhibits a demand for sexual commerce.
This situation is very common in areas such as Caranavi; but this is also true at the international level, in mining areas found mainly in the bordering areas with Chile and Peru.
6. Main elements to be considered when drawing conclusions
1. All the data shows that the city of El Alto has exhibited, for over twenty years, its own
economic, social and political dynamics even if it is physically connected to city of La Paz,
the country’s seat of government. It exhibits a fast demographic-spatial growth, which,
in a certain sense, is normal, due to the amount of young inhabitants. However, in strictu
sensu, its population is in a state of transition from a younger population towards one that
is more adult.
Another structural trait it exhibits is its identity as an Aymara city that constantly draws
from rural immigration flowing from the areas within the department of La Paz, and it maintains enduring bonds with its rural communities. However, the contrasts in the scenario of
El Alto are evident. The data consistently demonstrated the connection between poverty
and ethnicity; this has imprinted itself on and marked the processes of economic, social
and symbolic injustice. However, together with the situation of inequality, we also perceive
differences among the population of El Alto.
In this sense, during the past years the presence of Aymara elite groups has become increasingly evident. These are involved in diverse scenarios and in a wide range of activities,
ranging from productive activities associated to selling their wares (carpentry, furniture
design), to strictly commercial activities (furniture shops, hardware stores, textiles), to
services (hostels, restaurants). The most tangible evidence of the emergence of new elites
is the increase in the number of urban festivities in the different districts of El Alto, which
has become the stage where specific cultural consumption trends are enacted, as well as
mechanisms of solidarity rooted in cultural tradition.
Further, the construction of differentiated identities and the establishment of consumption
trends signaling distinction in one way or another, heighten the inequalities between the
different social strata. On one hand, it is possible to witness ostentatious cultural consumption patterns and, on the other, traditional practices related to impoverished spheres. In
25
any case, the context of this highly dynamic commercial urban center generates inequalities, lack of opportunities and the presence of modern trends of consumption among young
people where we will also find high degrees of commercial sexual activity.
The largest percentage of the population in city of El Alto is made up of young people who
build their social and cultural practices around both traditional and modern aesthetics.
However, the unemployment rate among young people has been twice as much as that
of the general national average for two decades now. The unemployment rate among the
youngest members of the population of El Alto is 15%. This population’s job status in the
labor market is highly unstable. According to CEDLA, unemployment and job instability
rates are greater among the young, which stands in contrast to the highly dynamic economic movement in the city.
Thus, we assume new identities emerged among the young people of El Alto – a city where
sexual commerce is very present – , identities shaped by a taste for designer and foreign
clothes, even if these are second-hand; food habits that value consuming fast food as a
sign of distinction; also, the dream of owning a house has given way to a desire for comfort
and the possession of electronic appliances associated to leisurely activities.
As we already stated at the beginning of this document, due to its historical, demographic, cultural, economic, social and political characteristics, El Alto is a unique city. It is the
youngest, poorest, most complex city in Bolivia, and its needs are constantly postponed in
regards to others; however, it is also the most dangerous and violent city.
2. The geo-referential mapping performed in the diverse districts in El Alto while looking for
critical areas related to Commercial Sexual Violence and human trafficking demonstrated
the first and oldest neighborhoods of the city – La Ceja, Villa Dolores, Ciudad Satelite, 16
de Julio and Ballivian – are noted not only for its high demographic density, houses built
with modern material and with good access to basic services, but also for its high levels
of delinquency and reports of criminal activity. A significant percentage of the inhabitants
of these areas are mainly employed in sales and services; further, there are many small
independent businesses and individuals who work at home (most of them women); these
all live in proximity with bars, call houses, hostels used as improvised motels and brothels.
The complexity and intricacy of the different situations existing around commercial sexual
violence in El Alto reflects a social phenomenon that is, in a certain sense, as new as the
city itself, but exhibiting a trend of rapid growth that follows an “entrepreneurial” mindset.
In this scenario, sexual commerce in this city can be understood as a highly prosperous and
powerful business.
This is compounded even more if we consider that in El Alto there are 30.000 identified
cases of children working in the street. Furthermore, there are many girls and adolescents
who already are victims of the dynamics of commercial sexual violence; however, there
are also many children and adolescents in situations of high risk, who constitute the most
vulnerable population of a very unfavorable economic, social and cultural environment.
Young girls and adolescents who face the greatest risk are those who sell on the streets,
who study in schools where there are groups of children and adolescents on the street or in
gangs, daughters of vending families, of sexual workers, of parents who consume drugs or
alcohol and homeless families or those suffering from extreme forms of domestic violence.
Our research revealed the latter is one of the most common factors related to situations
of vulnerability, since the processes related to the disintegration of the family unit and lack
26
of emotional support within the family, in association with different forms of abuse, lead
children and adolescents to abandon their homes.
3. As a result of this research, it is possible to conclude that the city of El Alto is a space for
capturing, transporting and distributing people for purposes of sexual commerce, a site
where the crime of human trafficking and commercial sexual violence is highly dynamic and
enabled by internal and external routes of transportation. There are many and varied types
of settings and actors who make a profit out of brothels, call houses and bars with links to
different criminal networks that trade in women, some of whom are girls and adolescents,
an activity enabled by circuits and physical spaces where sexual commerce is carried out.
The criminals involved in trafficking young and teenage girls in El Alto, Bolivia, take advantage of the diverse situations of vulnerability their victims face. Thus, this city becomes a
focal point for this crime. It was demonstrated that, when young and adolescent girls were
captured by traffickers, they were socially vulnerable. They came from environments of
domestic violence, reconstituted families, with parents who consumed drugs and/or alcohol
or victims of rape, who lived under poor economic conditions. Also, sometimes the traffickers were people who were closely related with the victim’s closest affective circle and took
advantage of this position. So, the living conditions of the victim are related with the forms
used to capture them. Many times, they are tricked into thinking they are being offered,
for example, jobs that would help them to improve their personal or domestic lives, and
sometimes even their emotional life.
Children, but especially young and adolescent girls, endure greater amounts of physical,
emotional and sexual violence from diverse social actors, such as johns or aggressors,
procurers, their own peers, police officers and the owners or managers of their places of
work. In this sense, children and adolescents are the object of social rejection, and this
causes them to endure even more social exclusion. Further, attention should be given to the
mechanisms employed by these criminal organizations to update their methods to capture
people, since nowadays they act using social media such as Facebook or similar channels.
4. The economic-commercial dynamics in general, but also the sex commerce in the city of
el Alto, influencing commercial sexual violence, is enabled by a series of “critical routes”
for transporting children, adolescents and young women at the intradepartmental, national
and international level. Though the presence and action of criminal organizations is real and
these are frequently connected with other networks abroad, one must not forget the importance urban markets have in these routes. In this sense, the mining industry is a common
factor in many of the testimonies collected. This means that this industry is related with
sexual commerce and trafficking of women.
An initial evidence of these routes is the close link between El Alto and La Paz, not just in
regards of the movement of sexual workers and victims of Commercial Sexual Violence,
but also regarding the customers, or “johns”, and aggressors. Furthermore, the logistics
behind the organization and operation of the sexual industry are similar, since models are
replicated, for example, regarding the numbers of call houses, the billing and recruitment
of johns, etc. We were also able to demonstrate that, in certain areas of El Alto, there are
actors enabling the capture, transportation and commerce of children and adolescents for
purposes of Commercial Sexual Violence.
At the departmental level, we can conclude that these two cities have an intense link with
the areas of Yungas, Caranavi, Sorata, Palos Blancos, Mapiri and Desaguadero. The sig27
nificance of places where there are mines is highly important, since these sites are destinations of sexual commerce at the departmental level. Some of the national routes linked
to El Alto - La Paz are Santa Cruz, Beni and, Cochabamba. It seems these are among the
circuits with greatest flow of sexual commerce in the country. As for international destinations, we have discovered two, the borders that are most connected with El Alto. These are
Argentina, especially through Villazon, and Peru, through Desaguadero.
5. As for the judicialization of cases of Commercial Sexual Violence in El Alto, it must be noted
that the enforceability of the current legal framework addressing this issue faces serious
difficulties when providing attention to victims. These obstacles are related as much to the
large amounts of bureaucracy faced when dealing with these cases, the economic burden
to the victims’ families who wish to investigate the crime and there is even the chance revictimization can take place in the midst of all these administrative proceedings.
Furthermore, the employees in institutions providing attention to victims are overworked
and this causes delays when treating their cases. Also, in some cases, there is a lack of
commitment from the public institutions in charge of investigating the criminal complaints.
To illustrate this, it is important to note that the office in charge of fighting against human
trafficking only employs one attorney specialized in the case, which results in delays in
criminal justice.
La Paz-Bolivia, Octuber, 2015
28
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31
BRASIL
INVESTIGATION
INTERFACES OF TOURISM AND MIGRATION:
VIOLATIONS OF THE RIGHTS OF YOUNG
PEOPLE AND ADOLESCENTS IN THE
BRAZILIAN CONTEXT
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
SALVADOR – BAHIA – BRAZIL
2015
32
INDEX
1.
Introduction
2.
Context
3.
Methodology
4.
Main conclusions per work topics
5.
Recommendations
33
INVESTIGATION
INTERFACES OF TOURISM AND MIGRATION: VIOLATIONS OF THE
RIGHTS OF YOUNG PEOPLE AND ADOLESCENTS IN THE BRAZILLIAN
CONTEXT
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1. Introduction
Centro Humanitário de Apoio à Mulher – CHAME, in agreement with Dutch organizations for development ICCO
Cooperation and AIDS FONDS, developed the program “Building bridges in the fight against commercial sexual
exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents” within the Stepping Stones Program.
The general purpose of this research, “Interfaces tourism and migration: Violations of the rights of young people
and adolescents in the Brazilian Context”, is to perform a study leading to a diagnosis of the different forms of
sexual exploitation and/or human trafficking of young people, identifying its different aspects within the context of tourism and, further, understand the situation of adolescents and young people in the commercial sexual
industry within the migration routes of the Latin American region towards Brazil.
Specific Objectives:
1. Diagnose the situation of vulnerability of adolescents and young people in the sexual industry, along the migration routes in Mato Grosso do Sul, on the border of Bolivia and
Paraguay.
2. Perform a qualitative study on the situation of adolescents/young people involved in sexual
exploitation in the tourism and human trafficking in Bahia and Ceará.
3. Develop and propose strategies to improve the rights of people living in situations of vulnerability and design public policies to enhance these rights.
In the first chapter, we organize the study around two main topics: tourism and migration,
conceptualizing and analyzing sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, human trafficking and gender exploitation, building on the idea that these issues intersect.
The second chapter describes the territorial limits of our study, summarizing relevant data of
the three states our field work focused on: Bahia, Ceará and Mato Grosso do Sul, located in
the country’s Northeast and Central-Western regions, respectively.
34
In the third chapter, we briefly summarize the main actions that took place within Brazil to address sexual exploitation and human trafficking. Further, we present the main instruments of these actions,
such as national plans and policies, treaties, conventions and international protocols endorsed
by Brazil. In this section, we summarize how the main legal ordinances in the country – the
Criminal Code, the Federal Constitution and Statute for Children and Adolescents (Estatuto
del niño, niña y adolescente – ECA, in Spanish) perceive and intervene in cases of possible
rights violations of children and adolescents.
In the fourth chapter, we present the main research topics, delimited and supported with
interviews and focus groups performed in the three states. This section allows us to see the
incidence of the cases of sexual exploitation and human trafficking in the interfaces of tourism
and migration.
Considering the complexity of the issue of human trafficking, and the data referred to the incidence of this crime, the fifth chapter displays a brief outline of the judicialized cases related to
human trafficking in Brazil, based on the main research carried out on the topic in the country
in the past fifteen years and the stories collected from the interviews.
The sixth chapter contains the study’s main conclusions and we close with a table of recommendations, built around the interviews, and, further, we present the corresponding final
remarks.
2. Context
Since Brazil is a vast territory, our research was limited to two regions in the country: North
East and Central Western areas; more specifically, in three states: Bahia, Ceará and Mato
Grosso do Sul, because these areas have a high flow of human trafficking and sexual exploitation in these regions and are key points for migration movements.
Sexual exploitation and human trafficking in children and adolescents, as well as gender exploitation in the tourism industry is a complex issue, since all related cases are permeated by
social, economic and cultural matters that take advantage of the structural frailties inherent in
each territory that enable these phenomena. This provided us another criterion that we used
in this research: the population size of the municipalities in these states result in significant
differences between the populations in the urban and rural regions.
As for the North Eastern region, we chose Bahia and Ceará not only because they attract tourists but because they have registered the largest numbers of sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents between the years 2005 and 2010 in Brazil, according to data provided by
the Intersectorial matrix to Combat Sexual Exploitation of children and adolescents (Matriz
intersectorial de enfrentamiento a la explotación sexual de niños/as y adolescents).
Mato Grosso do Sul’s vast frontier area favors the incidence of crimes such as human trafficking and sexual exploitation. it is also an area of intense migratory flow that requires special attention because of the large number of rights violations against specific populations of
children and adolescents from Brazil as well as from the neighboring countries of Bolivia and
Paraguay.
Thus, we find that the specific territorial configurations and geographies are closely related with
sexual exploitation and human trafficking and other phenomena, such as migration, local tourism development, as well as culture, race, gender and class. Further, be believe where poverty
and social inequality could be valuable topics around which further analyses could be made.
35
3. Methodology
Our methodology was based on action-research, understood as being closely related with actions or the resolution of collective problems. This method is known for being highly dynamic,
since it involves the action of its investigators and the people interviewed during the different
stages of the research. The interviews were semi-structured, open-ended and in-depth, and
were carried out in one-on-one conversation scenarios as well as with three focus groups.
First we carried out research using original secondary data from sources such as internet,
studies and other investigations, newspaper articles, books, publications on laws, national
and international conventions, statutes and other documentation related to the topic. Then,
we contacted organizations and specialists on the matter, and scheduled trips scheduled for
the months of May and June of 2015 to Mato Grosso do Sul and Ceará. CHAME is located in
one of the areas of study.
A total of 53 people were interviewed. Among them were: Specialists, academics, public officials, representatives of NGOs and religious organizations. The field work was carried out in
the months of May and June of 2015. The Recommendations in the document were suggested
by the people we interviewed.
4. Main conclusions according to work topics
TOPIC 1: Sexual Exploitation
Our findings agree that Brazilian legislature improved its actions against sexual violence affecting children and adolescents since 1990, when the latter started to be acknowledged as
subjects of law, and as such, as requiring the protection of the government, family and society
as a whole. These initiatives built on a social process mobilizing diverse actions (public policies) favoring new channels and instruments of action to combat the aforementioned crimes
and provide assistance to children and adolescents affected by sexual exploitation.
Though these advances seemed to be eradicating these crimes in Brazil, at least for a while,
previous investigations supported by our interviews demonstrate that it persists, and has
metastasized into other spheres that are even less visible. This greatly diminishes the state’s
ability to provide support to children and adolescents enduring this situation. The data collected demonstrate that a significant part of children and adolescents only receive attention in
institutions after they have been victimized by some form of exploitation. This indicates that
prevention goals set in Brazil’s most important plans and policies have not been met.
With the creation of Single System for Social Assistance – (Sistema Único de Asistencia Social, SUAS for its acronym in Spanish), the attention formerly offered by the Sentinela Program, that acted directly with the populations of children and adolescents living in situations
of sexual exploitation, was fused into the Service for Combating violence, Abuse And Sexual
Exploitation Against Children And Adolescents (Servicio de Enfrentamiento a la Violencia, al
Abuso y a la Explotación Sexual contra NNAs) within CREAS. All the people we interviewed
believe this is a major setback in the effort invested in prevention and attention of victims,
since the service lost its specificity by being grouped with other situations of rights violations.
Social vulnerability is seen as one of the main causes for the increase in sexual exploitation,
which grows together with the capitalist consumer society: its market-oriented approach,
36
focused on the accumulation of goods, sidelines children and adolescents. The precarious
basic conditions of survival they endure as well as the inadequate education, health, housing
and labor conditions enhance and enable sexual exploitation among the poorer populations
in Brazil.
TOPIC 2: Sexual exploitation in the tourism development
New concepts emerge in the debate regarding sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
in the context of tourism. Research demonstrates that one of the strategies of some Brazilian governments looking to address this phenomenon was to clean up areas acknowledged
as sites of prostitution and sexual exploitation, to reduce the visibility of sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents during the Confederations Soccer Cup and the World Cup. Even
if sexual exploitation did indeed decrease to some degree, we found that these strategies
adapted to the new circumstance and changed its format.
Most of the people we interviewed believe that these interventions to “clean up” sites of
prostitution simply leads to new forms and networks to enable sexual exploitation. they also
believe that it is necessary to acknowledge and understand that exploitation involves not only
foreign people but also local actors. our interviewees also believe that interventions organized
for large scale events, such as the sports events mentioned above, do constitute an advance
in terms of prevention of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
TOPIC 3: Human trafficking in children and adolescents
Though the issue of human trafficking has become more visible in society in the past years,
there are still some problems that can be pointed out:
Absence of conceptual alignment referred to human trafficking; this results in incoherence in
addressing the problem. Further, there is a void in concrete data referring to the issue, especially in cases related to children and adolescents. Even though the existence of this problem
in Brazil has been acknowledged, there is no work executed directly with victims. This leads
us to believe that the topic is still being met with a discourse of denial, stating “the problem
exists but not here”.
Además, se evidencia la debilidad de los dispositivos legales: Hace falta una ley específica
sobre trata de personas en el país. Aquellas leyes que sí tocan el tema están llenas de incoherencias, como es el caso de lo dispuesto en el artículo 83 del ECA, donde niños, niñas y
adolescentes con más de 12 años pueden viajar sin autorización de los padres en territorio
nacional, lo que viabiliza acciones concretas de protección. La ausencia de una ley específica
deja al país sin una forma de garantizar las acciones emprendidas dirigidas a proporcionar
atención y asistencia eficaces para las víctimas y sus familias.
Furthermore, the legal resources in place are weak. Brazil needs a specific law on human
trafficking. Though some of its laws do address the issue, we observe many incoherences,
such as Article 83 of ECA, which allows children and adolescents over the age of 12 to travel
freely around the country, a disposition that hinders specific actions for the protection of minors. without a specific law, the government has no way to ensure the actions undertaken to
effectively help and assist the victims of this crime and their families.
Another problem is that there is little data on human trafficking. We have found that the most
important investigations carried out on the issue are inconsistent when compared to other
investigations. Also, we find there is a much under-reporting of cases, complaints and police
37
records. However, we also discovered that the number of reports that do exist is higher than
those for judicialized processes and judicial rulings for this crime.
TOPIC 4: Effectiveness of public policies
The country has specific plans, programs and policies. However, their conceptual, flaws as
well as flaws in implementation and monitoring activities hinder the work of officials in charge
of enforcing these mechanisms.
Though there is a structure for monitoring actions in place, its budget is not enough to properly ensure its operation.
Existing instruments aimed at verifying plan execution and the enforcement of the law are
not clearly defined.
Institutions working to advocate for the rights of vulnerable populations have no protocol to
provide assistance because they do not benefit from public policies. Furthermore, access to
information is difficult.
Policies promoting education, health, assistance, among others, do not interrelate.
The participative power of those who could benefit from these policies is limited.
The government has coopted the leaders of the social movements and this, in turn, has weakened the latter’s capacity for lobbying and social mobilization.
The common good of the country is still associated with a political party and not a common
national goal.
The little importance given to these problems is reflected in the frequent changes in the staff
of the institutions addressing the issues. Further, people who work in these positions do not
have a background in the issues, have no proper training, are underpaid and their work conditions lack the necessary resources to ensure effectiveness.
The plans in place include actions impossible to execute due to a lack of proper budget.
TOPIC 5: Migration
The border of the Central Western region neighbors Bolivia and Paraguay, and is one of the territories most vulnerable to human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation. It is easy to
move from one country to another and there are no agents trained to combat human trafficking.
Existing public policies fail consider migration as an issue related to human trafficking and
sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. In Brazil, migrants are not considered as
citizens with rights; this is even more problematic when considering migrant children. Thus,
the incipient process of implementation of the new migration law does not contemplate the
vulnerable position of children and adolescents.
Existing social movements are waiting for the PLS288/2013 Immigration Law pass the House
of Representatives and for the government to ratify certain international conventions.
We found grave violations to the rights of children and adolescents – particularly those from
neighboring countries – seem to be justified in the minds of people by prejudice based on
socioeconomic differences existing in the migrant’s country of origin and are used as an ex38
cuse to justify exploitation. We found these violations occurring not only in the borders but
throughout the entire country.
There is quite a close relation between migration, tourism and human trafficking: young girls
from different states are taken to different tourist sites and lodged in hotels to be catering to
tourists, where the girls are sexually exploited. They remain there for three months before
they are moved again to be further exploited and, then, they are never seen again. Nobody
knows where they go. They remain in a sort of “private jail system”, and their fundamental
human rights and liberties are completely violated. This is specific to human trafficking.
In our study we provide multiple insights on the complex panorama that is sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents and young women. We can see an evident and increasing advance
in the issue’s visibility. We were able to establish that in recent years there are many more
social actors involved in fighting human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Furthermore, the
media is addressing the issue more openly.
However, it is also clear that this complexity is determined by specific circumstances within
each region’s cultural, social and economic dimensions. In spite of these differences, there are
common traits in the cities we studied: sSocial and economic inequality, inefficient security
infrastructure, flawed political and social programs, lack of opportunities, among others.
It is vitally important to work towards developing a new model based on the respect of human
rights that ensures equality and justice for men and women. This would help to eliminate this
atrocious world-wide violence that renders people into merchandise and turns dreams into
nightmares.
6. Recommendations
Attention and protection
Acknowledge children and adolescents as subjects of law, with agency to be part
of the process.
Create a plan that includes education, leisure, arts, sports to favor the development of children and adolescents.
Respect diversity.
Provide vulnerable populations direct access to support without intermediaries.
Work with families and ensure professional support for them.
Carry out more work in marginal areas.
Promote initiatives for projects aimed at working with specific groups, such as
young people and victims of human trafficking.
Public Policies
Ensure policy coordination and integration.
Ensure greater investment of funds to implement public policies to fight human
trafficking and sexual exploitation.
39
Provide support to institutions that shelter victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation.
Enhance the efforts to fight these crimes within the regions: this means enhancing
the system’s instruments actions and conditions aimed at ensuring human rights
so that these areas can have the same degree of attention provided to large metropolitan capitals and cities.
Promote discussion on the way reports pertaining these crimes can be addressed
and make the hotline Disque 100 be known.
Improve the working conditions of the Tutelary Councils and create a greater
number of specialized police stations.
Create multidisciplinary teams to ensure proper treatment that is specific to the
needs of the victims of these crimes.
Ensure human rights for everybody, not just for certain populations that meet certain requirements.
Give more value to human resources: use a different logic to hire personnel providing services to poor populations.
Ensure a minimum staff composed of professionals from CREAS who will remain
in their posts for a relatively stable amount of time.
Ensure a greater commitment from the three levels of the government (municipal,
state and federal levels)
Ensure the continuity of the actions undertaken to address these crimes.
Develop a true gender-sensitive policy, not limited to domestic violence.
Create specific public policies to ensure the income of transgender populations
and people with low levels of education.
Ensure specific public policies addressing prostitution that also includes transgender populations.
Change the current perspective for providing assistance to victims with one that
is based on safeguarding human, sexual and reproductive rights.
Articulation and networking
Actions and movements should act in coordination and not just in large-scale
events.
Enhance networking to cooperate with police efforts.
Acknowledge the potential of different social sectors to address these issues and
eliminate rivalries among them.
Design efforts for long term action that specifically and effectively address and
these crimes, and raise awareness of the issue.
Improve access to information.
40
Strengthen current networks combating sexual exploitation and human trafficking.
Provide continuous training for tutelary councilors, members of civil society and
government organizations specialized in advocating human rights.
Enhance the efforts for citizen security: train highway officers and federal police
agents. Create a formal education program to train professionals to address the
issue.
Design lines of action and support for research on these topics at the university
level.
Consolidate the work carried out by organizations to ensure their interaction and
coordination.
Ensure better coordination between the government and civil society.
Raise awareness on sexual exploitation as a problem that results in severe traumas for children and adolescents and open the topic for discussion on sexual exploitation of older populations as well.
Give more visibility to the issue of prostitution, especially regarding women living
in poverty.
Analyze public budgets assigned to policies addressing these crimes (focusing on
specific, allotted and spent budgets, not nominal budgets).
Increase efforts aimed at prevention in schools and community centers, and involve networks working on the issue: CRAS, CREAS, CAPS.
Salvador Bahia –Brazil, Octuber, 2015.
41
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Plano Decenal dos Direitos Humanos de Crianças e Adolescentes. Disponível em: http://www.
fas.curitiba.pr.gov.br/baixarMultimidia.aspx?idf=6086. Acesso: 02/02/2015.
PAES, Janiere Portela Leite. O Código de Menores e o Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente:
avanços e retrocessos. ConteúdoJurídico, Brasília-DF: 20 maio 2013. Disponível em: <http://
www.conteudojuridico.com.br/?artigos&ver=2.43515&seo=1>. Acesso: 14/02/2015.
Projeto de Lei do Senado 479 de 2012; Senado Federal. Disponível em: http://www.senado.
gov.br/atividade/materia/detalhes.asp?p_cod_mate=119888. Acesso: 14/03/2015.
ROCHA, Genylton Odilon Rêgo da; LEMOS, Flávia Cristina; LÍRIO, FlávioCorsini. Enfrentamento da Violência Sexual Contra Crianças e Adolescentes no Brasil: políticas públicas e o
papel da escola. Disponível em: http://periodicos.ufpel.edu.br/ojs2/index.php/caduc/article/
viewFile/1550/1457. Acesso: 12/03/2015.
ROSEMBERG, Fúlvia; MARIANO, Carmem Lúcia Sussel. A convenção internacional sobre
os direitos da criança: debates e tensões. Cad. Pesqui. [online]. 2010, vol.40, n.141,
pp. 693-728. ISSN 0100-1574. Disponível em: http://www.scielo.br/pdf/cp/v40n141/
v40n141a03.pdf. Acesso: 02/02 2015.
SANTOS, Eliane Araque dos. Criança e adolescente: sujeitos de direitos. Disponível em: http://
revista.ibict.br/inclusao/index.php/inclusao/article/viewFile/56/78. Acesso: 12/03/2015.
UNICEF - Centro de Estudos Innocenti. Manual sobre o protocolo facultativo relativo à venda
de crianças, prostituição infantil e pornografia infantil. Disponível em: http://www.unicef-irc.
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QUAGLIA, Giovani. Tráfico de Pessoas, um panorama histórico e mundial. In.: BRASIL.
Secretaria Nacional de Justiça. Política Nacional de Enfrentamento ao Tráfico de Pessoas/
Secretaria Nacional de Justiça. - 2. ed. - Brasília: SNJ, 2008.
44
INVESTIGATION
COLOMBIA
COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF
CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN
MINING – EXTRACTIONIST SITES
Santa Rosa (Bolívar),
Segovia (Antioquia),
Puerto Gaitán (Meta)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
BOGOTA - COLOMBIA
2015
45
INDEX
1.
Introduction
2.
Context
3.
Methodology
4.
Main Findings
5.
Conclusion and Recommendations
46
INVESTIGATION
COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN MINING – EXTRACTIONIST SITES
Santa Rosa (Bolívar), Segovia (Antioquia), Puerto Gaitán (Meta)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1. Introduction
Fundacion Renacer – Ecpat Colombia, – in the frame of its institutional mission to contribute
towards eradicating commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents by undertaking actions aimed at prevention, assistance to victims and investigation, has embarked on a
new investigative exercise, under the mode of an exploratory study that will allow approaching an understanding of the possible relationships established between mining-extractionist
activities and commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents , in three municipalities of the country located in regions affected by complex social issues: Santa Rosa (Bolívar),
Segovia (Antioquia), Puerto Gaitán (Meta).
According to the tradition and experience accrued by the Foundation, this study has been
undertaken from a social ethnographic approach that allows identifying and characterizing
scenarios, social actors and the relationships between these, using observation and interaction with said actors to account for, on one hand, the existence of a specific problem or phenomenon and, on the other hand, of the social perceptions and imaginaries underlying said
phenomenon. In the intersection of these two dimensions it is possible to understand the
complexity of the social reality, which is a construction in which each subject, from his or her
specific situation, summarizes and reflects his or her surroundings. Thus, diverse social actors
have participated, each with diverse interests and expectations: children and adolescents;
public officials; men and women inhabiting the communities where they perform different
roles and trades.
Commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents takes place in different scenarios
practically all over the national territory. In this case, we demonstrate how, though the mining
and extractionist companies do not cause the issue themselves, their presence and incidence
in the populations do catalyze and mobilize a series of factors acknowledged as giving rise to
it and enable violence against minors. In this sense, companies turn into social actors and, as
such, they should assume commitments for preventing and even mitigating these aforementioned risk factors.
47
The final purpose of this exercise is, then, to contribute insights and suggestions that aid in generating change and transformation in the underlying dynamics and imaginaries and which, in
fact, sustain commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. This purpose is carried
out by returning, disseminating, socializing and lobbying with public entities, both at the local
as well as the national levels. Ideally, such a return of research findings should also involve the
representatives of society, inhabitants of the territories where the research took place.
This document is composed of five chapters: The first one provides the context for some
issues addressing the mining-extractionist sector at the national level, especially as related
to the historic effects mining and oil companies have had on human rights of diverse populations. The second chapter presents an overview of the sites we studied, emphasizing on the
presence of internal armed conflict; the third chapter collects an analysis of the legislative
frame and the public policies related to protecting children and, particularly, related to commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents Chapter 4 outlines the methodology
used for the study, and includes the ethical criteria guiding the methodological application as
stated in the institutional commitment to safeguard the protection of the victims.
Chapter 5 presents the main findings of the study, combining the descriptions with fragments
of stories and testimonies provided by the participants, as well as some elements for analysis
focused on identifying risk factors. The final section tries to summarize the main conclusions
and draws some Recommendations that might guide the action of those in charge of ensuring
the rights of children and adolescents.
We hope this first approach to this problematic axis – the one connecting mining/extraction
activities with commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents – will raise awareness in the government and society of the gravity of the situation of children and adolescents
in these new scenarios, fostering insights and actions that will allow the implementation of
strategies to move forward in order to provide a coherent and comprehensive response to the
commitment to effectively ensure the rights of children in the country.
2. Context
Since 2006, the mining and oil industry boom in Colombia has been possible thanks to the
government’s support, entity that considers these activities as a motor for both, economic
and social development. However, the way the mining-energy policy has been implemented
has generated impacts at the social and environmental levels that affect some populations.
The enormous potential in non-renewable natural resource reserves has generated an exponential increase of direct foreign investment, what some have called “Mining Fever”, and which
is leading to managing the economy back once again towards one based on the extraction
of raw materials. This fact, linked with processes such as the increase of the production of
biofuels and the impact of free trade agreements, weakens or neglects traditional economic
sectors, such as agriculture and livestock, which, in the long range, places the country`s food
and environmental sustainability at risk.
An indicator of this boom is the increasing number of mining titles and request for such: In
2011, the National Mining Registry reported that 1,717 companies had concession titles to
explore or exploit mines. And individual owners hold about 7.200 titles to exploit silver, platinum, molybdenum, nickel, zinc as well as minerals used for construction, such as limestone,
sand and clay. Mines have also increased geometrically throughout the entire territory, reaching a number of 3,600 in that year3. By 2014, Anglo Gold Ashanti alone held 343 mining titles.
3
Magazine Semana, September, 2011
48
Issuing land titles has been problematic: According to many reports, since the Mining Code
was issued in 2001, “there was superposition of mining titles in national park areas
and moors, speculation, issuing titles without control and some were done so under suspicious circumstances, violating the rights of native indigenous and afrodescendant mining
communities and hoarding of titles”4. On the other hand, it was also disadvantageous for
artisanal miners: Though for powerful multinational companies obtaining titles received swift
preferential treatment, for artisanal miners, who have exploited the mines for decade to
subsist, the process of “normalization” has been tortuous and, in many cases, futile, due to
the amount and types of legal requirements demanded, most of which they cannot comply
with, in such a manner that, when their claims are submitted, these areas have already been
granted to new miners or speculators.
On the other hand, the involvement of narco paramilitary groups in mining activities has
turned the situation more complex and difficult for the ancestral communities living in these
territories, due to the environmental damage and the entire chain of violence these have unleashed. Thus, for example, the authorities have acknowledged that “the mines controlled by
the narco paramilitary leader Carlos Mario Jimenez, aka Macaco (extradited to the US), and
his second-in-command in Bloque Central Bolívar, Rodrigo Pérez, in the South of Bolívar, have
been inherited by other armed groups who control them now.” According to this same report,
published in Semana, “there is evidence –states El Tiempo— that they have reactivated their
hold in this sector, where they had already recruited minors and women to whom they
have provided identity documents and whom they treated as slaves in the service of
the mining company Grifos, of which Macaco’s wife was a partner”.
All this has generated persecution from the State aimed at illegal miners who have introduced
dredgers and pumps, or who use mining as a form of money laundering through the manipulation of royalties; this persecution has been reported to authorities as illegal because, in
some regions, it was aimed at criminal miners as well as artisanal miners in good standing.
Some political leaders who oppose the government state that this generalized persecution of
“illegal” mining real purpose is to open the way for the entry of multinational corporations.
Two great impacts can be highlighted as an effect of the transnational mining and oil company booms: On one hand, the environmental effects derived from the location of mining or oil
enclaves, or the types of practices used for exploitation and, on the other hand, the effects
on human rights resulting from the processes by which the companies settle in the territories
(land purchase, previous consultations), due to the labor policies or collusion with armed actors.
According to some investigations, “there is a direct correlation between the places where
investment is focused and the human rights violations in Colombia. Massacres, murders, displacement, land theft and even prohibitions to freely roam the territories are an evident and
sad reality that is linked to the expectations of multinational corporate investments”5. It was
also stated that municipalities with profits derived from mining-energy represent 35% of the
national total, but it is associated with 87% of people displaced from their land and 80% of
violations of human rights and International Humanitarian Law.
Mining companies and oil companies usually operate in areas affected by armed conflict, in
communities that have been the victims of forced displacement, afrodescendant and native
4
Ibid.
5
González, J., Salcedo, D., Rangel, L. Impactos en los Derechos Humanos de la implementación del Tratado de Libre Comercio
entre Colombia y Canadá. Línea base. Page 15.
49
indigenous communities. In some cases, it was stated there was a link between corporations,
paramilitary groups and the Armed forces, aimed at favoring the companies, resulting in the
exodus of populations or pressuring small owners to sell their lands at very low prices. In
some occasions, the inhabitants are accused of belonging to guerrilla groups to justify false
prosecutions, massacres or selective murder.
This environment of violence specifically affects children and adolescents, not to mention
marginalized populations, such as LGBTI people, who are rarely made visible in the studies
and reports carried out regarding the situation of human rights and International Humanitarian Law. One of said effects has been, precisely, the emergence, sedimentation and invisibilization of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
3. Methodology
We used qualitative methodology with a social ethnographic approach, to describe the dynamics of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, building on the narratives of
the protagonists. This approach was chosen for it allows carrying out direct observation in the
spaces, establishing direct interaction with social actors to know their perceptions on reality
and the sense they assign this reality. Further, it allows crossing this information (empirical
data) to an interpretative exercise, with information coming from other sources, through what
is known as triangulation.
The general purpose of this study was to “understand the dynamics of commercial sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents in municipalities with mining or extractionist activities”. It sought to identify the actors in this phenomenon (procurers, middle-men, exploiters-“johns” or clients), the scenarios where it takes place, who the victims are and how the
dynamics carry themselves out in their different modes, in order to establish the connections
with mining or extractive activities.
To ensure immersion in field, the researchers carry out preliminary works consisting in getting
to know the conceptual, ethical and political framework of commercial sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents, study the Context of the territories to study. Also, they design and
assess data collection instruments and, finally, draft an ethical code to ensure action without
harm, since part of the job is carried out with the participation of victimized children and adolescents. The ethical commitment implies taking viable protection measures to suspend rights
violations. To enable immersion, the researchers present themselves as educators in sexual
and reproductive health.
Data collection was carried out using semi-structured interviews to key informers and observation records. Also, educational activities were carried out with groups (workshops on STDHIV, sensitization workshops with young people to prevent commercial sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents) and writing stories with children and adolescents at school). The
systematization was done organizing the information in analysis matrixes, according to the
different variables, under two types of categories: pre-established and emerging.
4. Main findings
1. Commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in mining – ex
tractionist sites
Gold mining is an important activity that determines social and economic dynamics in mining
municipalities; the survival of many inhabitants and families depends on it. Further, it also
50
attracts foreign people to the area in search of their “golden dream”. In the framework of
Bourdieu`s habitus theory ([1995] 2010), habitus generates dispositions or “mental, corporeal schemes of perception, appreciation and action” that are “historically orchestrated”, that
in turn structure it as a social practice and, at the same time, are structured by it through
different generations. Further, it structures power hierarchies according to economic capacity;
the miner, big or mal, is the great actor in charge of quickening local economy. Children victimized by commercial sexual exploitation acknowledge that the main actors exploiting them
are men dedicated to mining.
In Segovia, the mines are located underneath the city, which represents a risk for the safety
of its inhabitants. Sexual exploitation generally takes place on weekends, when the miners
rest from their extenuating work day. In Segovia, pool parlors, canteens, night clubs and
bars are the preferred sites for them to unwind and entertain themselves, and they look for
contact with adult or teenaged women in these sites to have sexual intercourse in exchange
for some type of retribution or remuneration. This happens in the downtown sectors of the
municipalities.
It was also observed that in the camps or hamlets located in mining sites, far from the downtown sectors of Santa Rosa, where access is difficult, there are young girls and adolescent
girls who work in prostitution; further, they work in different jobs there, such as cooking for
the workers or they tend to liquor shops. They carry out these activities almost always accompanied by their mothers. There is no control or regulation from the authorities in these
hamlets, but there is the presence of armed groups who control the movement and receive
taxes from the owners of the mines who extract gold. This increases the risk of forced recruitment of children and adolescents by illegal armed groups.
2. Factors predisposing commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
The social and institutional culture of these municipalities lack a perspective on the rights of
Children. Children and adolescents are not acknowledged as subjects with rights and they
are attributed adult traits such as autonomy and self-determination from the age of 12, for
boys, and 14, for girls. This is reflected in two specific situations: On one hand, they are
hired to work directly with mining extraction activities or provide attention in stores. On the
other hand, the family and society accept affective relations and servile marriages of young
and adolescent girls with older men, whereas these marriages are not acknowledged as commercial sexual exploitation.
This situation is reflected in the parental neglect resulting in unprotected children and adolescents. Too many parents, giving their daughters up to a third party who will take care of her
sustenance in exchange for sexual and domestic servitude, is a way of ensuring the young
girl’s future –something that seldom really happens– but, also, it is a way of alleviating the
economic burden of her sustenance and education.
This creates an effect of normalization associated to two factors: The chauvinistic male-centered culture, which has characterized the country historically; the predominance of males
over females – daughters, wives – in the public and private spheres, places them in a position of dependence or instrumentalizes or objectifies theme, forbidding them from deciding
on aspects of their lives, or usurping their rights to self-determination. The second factor is
precisely the acceptance of prostitution as a way of life in androcentric communities and as a
legitimized means of survival for poor women.
51
Additionally, the history of social and political violence endured by these communities – in
Segovia, a large part of it is caused by conflicts over control of Frontino Gold Mines company,
transferred to the workers by its original owners as payment for work wages – contributes to
make the region’s dwellers to feel there is little space to demand their rights. As a result, of
this, almost no one is interested in reporting these types of rights violations, for fear of compromising their safety and integrity as a result of affecting the interests of specific groups or
people. The authorities themselves acknowledge their impotence to enforce their functions
to ensure and protect the rights of children and adolescents.
3. Commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in oil – extraction sites
Puerto Gaitán and Acacías have been historically social determined by the social and armed
conflict endured by the country. These settlements underwent a colonization process during
the fifties in the Twentieth century, by groups of liberal guerrillas who were either fleeing conservative persecution or who had their rearguard. These colonization processes did not take
place without conflict over land and eviction of the native indigenous peoples who survived
on what they could garner from the jungle. When, during the 70’s, the first oil wells were discovered, there was a deluge of corporations and workers flooding in that altered forever the
course of history of that region.
Oil production displaced a good proportion of traditional agrarian and livestock activities, and
became the center of attention of the region’s inhabitants: a promise of development, progress and welfare handed out constantly by politicians, businessmen and legislators. The population`s economy and customs were transformed when oil became a factor in the equation:
Commercial activities related to tourism increase, infrastructure to support and house waves of
foreigners grows and, of course, the local population benefits. Native indigenous communities
become permanently displaced from their land and are confined in reservations. Young and
adolescent women become involved in prostitution. Poverty increases as oil production grows.
Many workers are hired under the 21x9 system: twenty-one days of work at the camps for
nine days of rest in the city; during these periods, those who do not return to cities such as
Villavicencio or other capital cities remain in the municipality and they become “tourists”,
making use of the infrastructure designed and built thinking of the boom of floating population
in the territory. This has stimulated the increase in prostitution that is, however, controlled
by illegal armed groups that set schedules where the inhabitants are not allowed to remain
in public spaces.
Native indigenous leaders acknowledge that, with the oil boom, some native indigenous young
women have been systematically harassed and abused sexually, and forced into commercial
sexual exploitation, based on the perception of the exploiters that, native indigenous women
become adults at 14 according to the latter’s ethnic traditions. Though many of these girls
from Sikuani parents have lived their infancy and preadolescent years in racially mixed contexts, many inhabitants still see them as being inferior and foreign, and this seems to justify
violence and exploitation. At some moment, these girls who used to endure being raped in
public spaces, were forcefully punished by armed groups who developed stigmatization and
humiliation practices, such as exhibiting them in public after shaving off their heads, a practice reported by the media as the “bald women of Puerto Gaitán”.
But native indigenous young girls have not been the only ones to endure sexual violence:
testimonies were gathered from mixed race girls in school who expressed the incredibly high
52
levels of sexual abuse and exploitation they must endure from locals and foreigners: domestic sexual abuse, obscene offers to have sexual intercourse for money, death threats to
pressure them into performing sexual acts or carnal access, exchange of money or products
in exchange of being molested or allowing sexual contact; sexual harassment through smartphones (grooming) or social media, trafficking for purposes of sexual exploitation. There are
even testimonies of girls being murdered after being raped.
Testimonies regarding sexual violence enabled by social media against children and adolescents are a recurring topic. These testimonies are evidence of how many young girls and adolescents are offered through these media as prostitutes or as pre-paid sexual providers. In
other occasions, videos of young girls having intercourse or exhibiting themselves are disseminated. Though these may not have commercial purposes, they, in fact, look to humiliate and
degrade them. These situations are aggravated even further when the girls have no support
in their families, schools or state institutions that could provide them the opportunity of being
listened or to report what is going on. They are left to their own devices and must learn to
deal with this pressure with their own resources.
There are also records of servile marriages or unions: Parents of children think they are contributing towards ensuring a stable future for their daughters when they allow older men in
good economic status give them some sort of economic retribution to have pseudo affective
relations with these girls. Here, we see a ‘selective perception’ focused on the material advantages derived from these relations and ignoring the implications that, in the long term, affect
the development and health of the underage girls.
The situations narrated allow us to conclude that those populations exposed to the arrival of
powerful companies endure changes in their social structures, transformations through which
the communities attempt to mod to the needs of those who introduce themselves as powerful subjects are the sole providers of income, and offer the inhabitants salaries that exceed
– sometimes vastly – the historic average incomes of these communities. Thus, these generate consumption and well-being expectations that, afterwards, are not sustainable once the
contracts end or production stops. When this happens, the local inhabitant no longer wishes
to or cannot return to his traditional way of life. Thus, he decides to migrate to nearby urban
centers or simply to wait until the company hires him back, increasing the ranks of the unemployed while he spends whatever money he had earned.
When the oil market conditions change and production decreases, these populations lose their
stability, since they had become accustomed to job conditions imposed by the oil industry in
their region and to a certain level of income that once exceeded the earnings accrued from
working in agriculture or with livestock. Thus, a crisis is produced affecting many families and
these are forced to look for other means of sustenance, sometimes even outside of their region. In this context, children and adolescents become even more vulnerable to commercial
sexual exploitation.
The impact of the oil industry on the commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is not limited to the fact that many of exploiters are part of this industry, workers
associated to extraction processes or its supply chain takes, since the victims state there are
other profiles as well – young men between 20 and 25 years, who work in informal commerce
– and, further, there are also middle-men. The main effect of the oil industry boom are the
cultural and social modifications the inhabitants of the municipality must face.
These cultural processes, modified by the arrival of the extraction industry, enable the existence of a system of social, economic and political relations that are accepted and assimilated
53
by social actors, and which allow young and adolescent women to “naturally” find a place of
dependence assigned to them and, there, to become the sexual partner of men who possess
the capacity to ensure an economic future they should find desirable as women.
The arrival of immense corporate projects is considered a reflection of the government`s and
company´s commitment to the region; however, we have also found that this brings into existence a dynamics of power between those who dominate and those who are dominated. The
dominant subjects are those who perform actions aimed at the region’s progress and development, while the dominated subjects are the community’s inhabitants who, though well-aware
of the possibilities for progress, come to gradually realize that they are losing their territory
and their exclusion is increased.
Though the actions aimed at improving the offer of restaurants, roads and lodging facilities
allegedly benefit the municipality’s inhabitants, a dichotomy is generated between the local
and the foreign actors, consolidating prejudices associated to the cultural heritage of those
belonging to the native culture and differentiated from newcomers with different cultural and
relational practices. These two poles, the traditional mindset and those belonging to the new
arrivals, are important in the processes of building the sensitivity of the subjects (both local
and foreign), who place themselves socially according to the social, cultural and economic
capitals, and tend to identify foreign agents as those with the power to purchase and possess
in opposition to the local dwellers, who are in placed in the condition of receiving whatever it
is the foreigners wish to give.
These conditions propitiate, favor or enable the occurrence of commercial sexual exploitation
of children and legitimate children and adolescents as objects available for sexual use and
exchange. While the culture admits gender roles where the man – the foreign man – is the
provider, and the woman – the native or local woman – is a passive receiving subject, commercial sexual exploitation of young and adolescent girls becomes invisible.
5. Conclusions and recommendations
1. The study allowed acknowledging the presence of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in territories that, though possessing diverse social, economic and
cultural characteristics, have been afflicted by two similar phenomena: The presence of
armed actors and the incidence of mining companies and other extractive activities, are
part of the traditional economy of native indigenous populations, but has also served to
fund insurgent groups. The arrival of multinational corporations has caused social, environmental, legal and political conflicts resulting from disputes to control exploitation and
commercialization of ores. . All this, together with the effect of imaginaries and traditional
practices related to the patriarchal structure of Colombian society have generated complex
environments of violence where commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents has an ideal space of emergence, development and sedimentation. In the case of
municipalities with oil extractive activities, the entry of oil companies has resulted in other
forms of violence that also affect local inhabitants.
2. The study allows acknowledging that even when direct foreign investment expressed in
mining and oil exploitation is presented as an activity to ensure the wellbeing and development of local populations, the extractive projects significantly influence the creation of social and economic conditions translated into factors of vulnerability for commercial sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents. On one hand, corporations enforce labor policies
that positively and also negatively affect local dwellers and their families. The corporation
54
employs a good part of the local labor and displaces traditional economic activities; it also
fosters infrastructural development and the goods and services market to ensure the subsistence and entertainment of its employees and, finally, it attracts foreign employees who
interact with local populations from an apparently superior academic, social and economic
position. These temporary visitors enter the daily and traditional lifestyles of local dwellers:
they are workers during the week, but, during the weekends, they feel they are tourists,
veiled in anonymity, adopting a different and ephemeral identity that enables commercial
sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
3. The economic impact of extractive projects can also be seen when the market expands or
shrinks. Corporations not only absorb the cities’ productive potential, but also exploit and
deplete the land and its natural resources. Initially, they seem beneficial because they generate local job positions, apparently favoring the construction of life projects. They, however, also generate patterns of consumption and satisfaction of needs that in the long run, as
a result of fluctuations of the market, cannot be sustained. When conditions change, and
faced with no possibilities to satisfy their expectations for quality of life, the families are
forced to migrate or adopt forms to generate income that leave especially girls and young
women vulnerable to sexual exploitation.
4. One of the negative effects of development oriented economic policies focused on the expansion of mining (extractivismo) has been the displacement of some native indigenous
communities. This has been made possible thanks to the local and national government
neglect endured by these communities, instances that have shown no political will to support and promote their social and economic development acknowledging ethnic and cultural diversity and the respect to autonomy and participation of these communities. This
neglect increases the vulnerability of these communities exposing children and adolescents
to vulnerability.
5. The tenuous presence of the government in the municipalities where the study took place
is a factor enabling the permanence of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. This weak presence expresses itself in the scarce capacity of public officials to
identify scenarios, practices and actors related to commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents - partly because they themselves participate in the cultural beliefs
justifying and naturalizing it - ; in the lack or scarcity of technical and financial funds to
undertake systematic actions to address the issue comprehensively; in the incidence of illegal actors that hinder the local government´s operations, by establishing their own forms
of social control; in the incapacity of its institutional actors to generate the commitment
of other actors, such as mining and oil companies, in the mitigation of the impact of their
operations in the regions, as well as in the prevention and eradication of commercial sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents.
6. Commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents undergoes a naturalization or
normalization process in the territories of our study. It takes place in public venues and establishments legally regulated commercially; further, it is practiced by citizens of different
origins and conditions who live in the same territory. Prostitution, in turn, is acknowledged
and tolerated as a traditional informal activity and sometimes is even controlled by armed
actors; further, it has been linked to mining activities as a highly profitable business. In
this context, the naturalization of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is particularly evident in the high incidence of servile forced premature weddings
to which girls and young adolescent women are subjected; these practices are, in turn, a
55
traditional outlet justified by the family’s impoverished way of life, in the stereotype that
sees women as being dependent or in traditional customs in certain native indigenous
communities.
7. It is necessary that mining and oil exploitation projects have a more efficient and strict regulation from the Colombian government in the municipalities studied, specifically pertaining the need to identify potential impacts, not just environmental in nature, but also social
and cultural, resulting from the operation of these companies. Further, it is necessary to
implement effective mid to long term measures to reduce said impacts. Though not many
companies directly generate situations of commercial sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents, it is fundamental that it be acknowledged as a risk resulting from the companies’ introduction into these territories, especially when involving the presence of foreign
people as part of their staff or provision chains.
8. Companies should include effective strategies to prevent sexual exploitation children and
adolescents by their staff in their planning processes, as well as measures to ensure the
harmonization of their productive practices with sociocultural processes present in the region, especially with native indigenous communities. In this sense, it is fundamental that
the processes of previous consultation acknowledge the social and cultural specificities of
the communities and that the mitigation measures do not adopt a merely symptomatic
and condescending approach. Company workers should be sensitized to understand and
value the local culture and understand the social and cultural impact of their actions as
individuals and representatives of the company. Further, they should also be sensitized on
prevention of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
9. In this sense, it is necessary to complement mining and oil drilling projects with previous
and simultaneous processes to prepare the population for the impact from resulting economic and social changes. Thus, it would be possible to implement a true sustainable development focused on the communities. In this sense, at least two types of actions should
be undertaken: On one hand, processes to enhance the specialized technical skills of the
population, so they may increase their chances of being employed by the companies and
projects in question; on the other hand, it is important to foster and enhance productive
projects with the communities in order to generate social and economic balance in a way
that, when the mining or oil projects decrease or leave the territories, the communities
may have sustainable alternatives for sustenance.
10. Municipalities affected by mining and oil projects should develop sensitization plans and
programs on commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents as a crime that
violates fundamental human rights. Corporate and commercial and/or tourist companies
should have commercial and revenue regulations as well as measures to protect human
rights. Companies must commit to protect human rights with self-regulating strategies
without undermining government control and social supervision.
11. This is only possible if the communities themselves are able to set up a culture to ensure, respect and protect the rights of children and adolescents. Thus, the state must
acknowledge the traditional dynamics and forms of community organizations historically
established in traditional mining communities, ensuring they are environmentally, socially,
culturally sustainable and ensure food sustainability as well, and also generate processes
of institutional support that would allow them to adopt the perspective of safeguarding
the rights of children, and critically revise attitudes, believes and practices that permeate
56
child labor, forced servile marriages with children and adolescents and commercial sexual
exploitation, in such a way that it will be possible to acknowledge children and adolescents
as subjects of law. As such, they should be living in a specific vital cycle and should be
provided with specific options of education, leisure and social interaction.
12. It is vital to enhance the respect of farmers and dwellers in local communities as a part of
any measure taken to prevent commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
Further, it is also important to empower them to acknowledge, appreciate and defend their
ancestral traditions and values. The state should develop processes of intercultural dialogue that would allow native indigenous peoples to gradually modify those practices that
damage children’s development. It is important to foster inclusion in ethnoeducation in
the study plan at all educational cycles in cities where native indigenous communities live
to promote acknowledgement and respect towards different cultures and the progressive
inclusion of native peoples.
13. A program to prevent commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents must
include sensitization strategies and education of children and adolescents in school institutions in the proper use of information technologies. Thus, they would be able to avoid
sexual violence and risks of objectifying girls and adolescent girls and be empowered
against grooming and sexting from pedophiles and sexual predators who use social media
and smartphone technology for this end. A similar task should be carried out by parents to
empower them and perform their proper protective role in online environments as well. It
is essential also that internet café administrators be trained and supported by authorities
to effectively prevent sexual violence from users.
14. Municipal authorities should strive to propitiate cultural transformations in populations
under their influence, especially to generate transformations in gender perceptions and relations. It is important to eliminate the idea that being a woman should mean means having to be economically and emotionally dependent, a sexual object, that young girls and
teen girls should to carry out roles of sexual and domestic servitude, or child-bearing and
rearing roles. Sexual exploitation will only be eradicated when this situation is effectively
transformed through the education of men, women, girls and boys in different spaces. Not
just in schools but also outside educational institutions, even within companies, social,
community organizations, youth groups, etc.
15.It is necessary to effectively implement the so called National System for Family Well-Being to ensure, prevent threats and reestablish the rights taken away from children and
adolescents, especially those victimized by commercial sexual exploitation, sexual violence
and human trafficking. Thus, it is necessary that all intervening entities have and explicit
operative definition of these issues in their plans and programs as well as properly trained
staff able to identify victims, provide them with specialized, relevant, quality help, execute
appropriate interventions with different groups and communities and provide these the
skills needed to avoid these problems, etc. Defining protocols to provide attention is necessary, but not enough to ensure a comprehensive approach. It is necessary to enhance
coordination efforts between different institutions to unify proceedings, analyze specific
factors of vulnerability, exchange information regarding dynamics and involve other social
actors in prevention actions (companies, youth organizations, community leaders, Transportation companies, etc.).
Bogotá-Colombia, Octuber, 2015.
57
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61
PARAGUAY
INVESTIGATION
A STUDY OF THE CONDITIONS OF
LIVING AND EXCLUSION OF
CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS FACING
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND
TRAFFICKING IN PARAGUAY
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
PARAGUAY
2015
62
INDEX
1. Introduction
2. Context of the Study
4. Main findings
5. Recommendations
63
INVESTIGATION
A STUDY OF THE CONDITIONS OF LIVING AND EXCLUSION OF
CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS FACING SEXUAL EXPLOITATION
AND HUMAN TRAFFICKING IN PARAGUAY
Executive Summary
1. Introduction
To design a proper strategy and generate actions and legislation coherent with the situation
of Paraguay regarding the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents (ESNNA, for its
abbreviation in Spanish), it is important to know the situations and conditions its victims
face.
The object of this study is to provide a quantitative description of the living conditions of
children and adolescents in Paraguay, based on statistics provided by public and international
organizations. Further, we analyze of the multidimensionality of the causes of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, considering the generational variable as well as diverse factors that compound inequality and oppression, from a human rights perspective.
To achieve this purpose, the study provides an updated description of the country’s prospect on the living conditions of children and adolescents in Paraguay. Faced with diverse
forms of sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents, we opted for a
type of planning based on a social-territorial approach resulting from empirical qualitative
evidence.
Though there is a tendency to link what is traditionally called child prostitution with this issue we study – the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents – our study states that
crimes related to sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents result from
the impoverished living conditions of children and adolescents; the reduced amount of State
intervention and the compounding ideological narratives in effect undermine the agency of
children and adolescents, whether due to age, gender, ethnicity, place of origin or language.
These narratives always aim at dominating and possessing these subjects, who are people in
process of building their vital paths of life.
The study aims to expand knowledge on children and adolescents who face the greatest levels
of social disadvantages and/or social exclusion, by providing relevant input and data oriented
towards counteracting the emergence of different types of criminal individuals and organi64
zations who traffic in minors, to force them to live all sorts of abuse and sexual exploitation.
2. Context of the study
In the Latin American Context, the demographic structure of Paraguay stands out for being
largely young. The country has a large amount of children and adolescent population. Four
out of ten inhabitants are under 15 years. This means, specifically, that about of a total population of 6,700,000 people, approximately 2,084,000 of them are under 15 years.
This can be a disadvantage in terms of development, but it is also a worrisome situation when
considering to sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents in conditions
of structural inequality, situations of discrimination and significant difficulties in acknowledging sexual and reproductive rights. The numbers demonstrate clearly that exclusion is a very
important factor influencing the social trends affecting children. The social map of Paraguay
demonstrates that 1,410,136 people under 15 years live in situations of vulnerability; this
means 67,8% of the population of Paraguay under 15 years of age.
54% of the native indigenous population is under 18 years, which results in specific requirements
of public services such as education, health, leisure, among others, and, in the short term, the
possibility of creating families and the resulting requirements for ensuring their wellbeing. It is
highly evident that most of the children of native indigenous peoples suffer exclusion. 77% of
native indigenous children lives in poverty, while 63% live in extreme poverty. In general terms, 23.5% (436,419) of children and adolescents in Paraguay are in the job
market. 66.5% does domestic chores in their family unit; among women, this figure reaches
73.6%. 21.3% of children and adolescents work in hazardous jobs. Barely 1 out of 4 children
and adolescents is exclusively dedicated to their studies. Another worrisome figure is that
approximately 95% of working children and adolescents in Paraguay works in hazardous jobs,
where they handle heavy loads or machinery, face long work hours, work night shifts, handle
toxic materials or are exposed to factors of risk.
Further compounding the issue is the tradition of criadazgo, a form of unpaid domestic servitude performed by children and adolescents in the homes of third parties, considered natural
in Paraguay. Under this form of child labor, it was found that 9 out of 10 adolescents girls rescued from human trafficking in Paraguay performed unpaid work as maids in this traditional
form of child domestic servitude. These girls had a history of working arduously, sometimes
even of being sexually exploited, in the homes of strangers. 73,4% of the children and adolescents provided as servants comes from settlements inside the country (Capelli, 2013). The
proportion of and from 0 to 8 years of age living in houses with critical overcrowded conditions
is almost 21% in urban areas and 30% in the countryside.
20% of pregnancies in Paraguay corresponds to adolescents and young girls. Reports demonstrate that during 2014, 650 young girls between 10 to 14 years gave birth, this means at a
rate of two girls per day. This figure undeniably demonstrates sexual abuse. This information
is key to reflect upon human exploitation and traffic, since it is fundamental to investigate
how these pregnancies happened. These and other profound disparities and inequalities that
take place in the country take place in a historical moment of favorable economic growth that
should be auspicious for general development. However, there still exist profound social-spatial disparities, as is fundamentally expressed in the inequalities faced by migrating families
and especially children and adolescents.
65
As a matter of fact, the socio-domestic traits and life expectancy are conditioned by context.
In many territories of Paraguay, various regions are entering the agrobusiness dynamics of
economic development, which results in worrisome situations of sexual exploitation in said
areas. The “agrobusiness system” (commodity systems) is characterized by business derived
from large agrarian activity, which is enabled by the use of biotechnology and modern technology, with an agrobusiness entrepreneurial type of development. In Paraguay and South
America, this is executed relying heavily on models developed for soy production, which results in the depopulation of peasant and native indigenous societies as well as an increasing
concentration of land ownership.
The variations of the reasons behind sexual exploitation of children and adolescents are not
only related to structural aspects and the conditions of its victims and families. It is also possible to clearly establish that these are associated to different adult subjectivities common to
the massification of consumer society, a change in the assessment on the body, which results
in the validation of new forms of exploitation of people under 18 years of age.
The scope of territorial situations of sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and
adolescents encompasses six departments in the country -Paraguarí, Presidente Hayes,
Caaguazú, Amambay, Alto Paraná, Central – as well as Asunción. Information was gathered
from the experiences, perceptions and perspectives of sources who work with different groups
of children and adolescents as well as in the domain of sexual exploitation. In specific terms,
we highlight the following territories studied:
• Three cross-border areas: children and adolescents from Ciudad del Este (Department of
Alto Paraná), located in the Triple Border of Paraguay with Brazil (Foz de Iguaçu, State of
Paraná) and Argentina (Port Iguaçu - Misiones Province); children and adolescents from
Pedro Juan Caballero and other frontier passages in the department of Amambay, in the
border with Brazil; and the situation of children and adolescents in the area of Port José
Falcón (department of Presidente Hayes), river area located between the rivers Paraguay
and Pilcomayo, in the border with Argentina (Clorinda – Province of Formosa).
• Cities with a high level of internal migration influenced by the new type of agrarian production (agronegocios) configured by private activity which is practically without any government control, belonging to the department of Caaguazú. These cities growth showed the
highest rate of urban growth in the country during the last decade, due to successive waves
of peasant migration. In this regard, we selected to study the situation of children and
adolescents in two urban centers: The city of Coronel Oviedo (capital of the department,
located between important international paths, and the city of Caaguazú (the largest one in
the department, located between Ciudad del Este and Asunción).
• Children and adolescents from families belonging to the Päi Tavyterã ethnic group (department) of Amambay
• Children and adolescents from urban settlements in Asunción.
• Children and adolescents with diverse gender identities in urban areas in Asunción and Ciudad del Este.
The core guiding the study is its human rights approach, which implies assuming structural
or systemic dimensions have the highest priority and that the context and the circumstances
66
surrounding sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents vary from one
to the other.
We performed a brief theoretical review on the concept of sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents as a starting point to investigate the types of uses endured by children and adolescents as sexual objects within the complex sociocultural reality of Paraguay, its specific
characteristics and modes, among other issues.
Though the concept of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is more generically
known as commercial sexual exploitation, or CSE, in this study we adapted it to the construct
of the experience in Paraguay, according to the context of operation of the organizations
working for over 20 years in this domain. Thus, we used the notion of sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents (ESNNA, for its abbreviation in Spanish), defined as crimes and
rights violations where adults subdue the will of children and adolescents to use their bodies
in different ways, such as sexual activity, offering, for this purpose, anything from money,
goods, up to protection, means of survival or a guise of affection, without regards to the
frequency or moment of sexual exploitation, that may or may not be related to human trafficking.
We used three conceptual and methodological tools of interest for our study:
The first one is the problematization of social territories and sectors selected as axes ordering
the narrative of circumstances surrounding sexual crimes against children and adolescents. In
this regard, the study employed duly trained indigenous women to perform 32 interviews and
carry two field journals. This would provide a bank of concise descriptions of cases of sexual
exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents among native indigenous people;
further this was be complemented with an interpretation of the data provided by the authors.
A second element is the notion of Type Situations (IBASE-POLIS-BASE IS, 2008), a tool that
has become extremely useful in identifying and organizing the construction of the inventory
of complex social phenomena, In this case, the development of sexual exploitation crimes
and human trafficking affecting minors under 18 years of age in Paraguay. Further, this methodology has been proven and, In this case, it can contribute to obtaining technical grounded
definitions on children and adolescents as subjects for intervention, to formulate and develop
more efficient policies to fight sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents
and to possess more comprehensible approaches and methodologies.
A third element structuring this research was attempting to consider the child and adolescent
subjects in regards to the adult world and those of their peers. This last is related with analysis of the trends exhibited by the structure of opportunities: The strength of family unit’s
and community’s support, the conditions of the (legal and illegal) market together with the
presence of the state and its institutions as guarantors and protectors of the lives of children
and adolescents. In other words, mechanisms enabling and ensuring access to services aimed
at the protection of social rights, equal health opportunities, services of reproductive health
and programs of comprehensive sexual education, equality in access to all levels of education
as well as opportunities to establish networks between the state and its actors (children, adolescents, women, native indigenous peoples and immigrants), and the hierarchy of the critical
demands and design of proper responses.
This report required using diverse sources. On one hand, statistics on the living conditions of
children and adolescents in general within Paraguay. On the other hand, qualitative research
67
based on interviews aimed at a variety of actors who are familiar with the situation of children
and adolescents, or who are related to fighting the sexual exploitation and trafficking of minors, as well as journals used by native indigenous women leaders.
The research was mainly organized in territories where children and adolescents living under
the line of poverty live, since they belong to marginal urban settlements, native indigenous
communities receiving very little attention from the State, or from families with insufficient
income. Further, the research highlighted the diversity and heterogeneity of children and adolescents. Thus, the analysis includes territorial considerations of each and every one of the
referents consulted and who provided valuable cooperation to this study. The latter is also
complemented with analysis on the Critical Routes Used for Crimes of Sexual Exploitation and
Human Trafficking of Children and Adolescents in Paraguay (see the complementary study).
The selection of interviewees was based on criteria regarding gender, accessibility and heterogeneity (in correspondence with the territorial diversity as well as the field of civil society
and government organizations). In this regard, four categories for key informants were set:
i. Experts on children and adolescents with knowledge on human trafficking;
ii. Government officials with knowledge of the situations of Children and Adolescents and human trafficking;
iii. Movements;
iv. Technical teams of civil society organizations working with children and adolescents and
populations that are vulnerable and live in situations of risk;
v. Women leaders from native indigenous organizations.
The data was treated using a qualitative approach according to the following procedure a)
We identified the minimum units of analysis or specific units of meaning, according to the
objectives set by the study; b) we located in the textual corpus the units of context that acted
as the highest interpretative framework, c) simultaneously, we categorized the registry units
as Type situations of Sexual Exploitation and Human Trafficking in Children and Adolescents,
according to social-territory criteria, observing similarities and differences found in the discourse of the sources. In this regard, most of the data analysis is detailed in the aforementioned study Critical Routes Used for Crimes of Sexual Exploitation and Human Trafficking of
Children and Adolescents in Paraguay. This allows mapping the current and complex universe
of sexual violence towards children and adolescents.
With this methodology, the analysis strategy consisted in problematizing certain specificities
in which dimensions referred to action scenarios (street, neighborhood, community) and of
structural order (material and cultural); and to capture, from the perspective of the adults
consulted, other central elements of the life stories of children and adolescents who have
been sexually exploited.
4. Main findings
The report analyzes three powerful forces that open up new scenarios for sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents in Paraguay. On one hand, we observed symbolic processes and
cultural ways that generate form superiority at the cost of excluding children and adolescents;
these are the bases for impunity and injustice in the crimes analyzed.
68
On the other hand, in regards to economic issues, the activation of extractive economy,
together with a small economic-productive diversification, has contributed to alter peasant
and native indigenous agriculture. Thus, a stream of sexual exploitation of and trafficking in
children and adolescents has opened up leading to the extractive sector of agrobusiness, one
that has taken on traits intricately linked with the reactivation of the economic reactivation of
extractive industries in Paraguay.
Finally, we have also evidenced the growth of what is known as mobster capitalism in many of
the routes used by sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents. According to this perspective, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is a part of an array of
crimes fan included in the illegal coercive-political facet of the expansion of capitalism aimed
at appropriating capital through diverse illegal activities that result in great profit (Ana Ceceña, 2002; Luis Rojas, 2015).
Among the main problems faced by children and adolescents vulnerable to sexual exploitation
and human trafficking is the violation of their rights. Some of the social conditions victims
must face involve a lack of education and a high percentage of students dropping out of
school. This situation is compounded when also considering that these populations have problems accessing health care, drinking water, proper conditions of sanitation, housing. Further,
a significant portion of these children and adolescents have no identification papers.
It is also evident that there is a direct relationship between processes of family migrations
from the countryside to the city, a lack of material resources and income and, further, the
State’s presence is basically nonexistent.
Many of the most serious problems faced by children and adolescents who suffer from sexual
exploitation in Paraguay are caused by the State’s neglect of its basic functions (protection
of children and adolescents, education, health, participation). It is also necessary to indicate
that it is vitally necessary to reverse the currently restricted sexual education and the lack of
specific legislation to protect sexual and reproductive rights.
Analysis of the forms of sexual exploitation operating in the territories in the study:
The territories and social sectors are the axes systematizing the narratives of the different situations surrounding the crimes considered in this study. Cross-checking with territorial data
resulted in 19 situations existing in the domain of sexual exploitation. This allows charting a
first draft of a map of sexual exploitation of and trafficking in children and adolescents based
on the social-territorial perspective. Empirical evidence presents at least six levels where it is
necessary to work in order to prevent and fight against sexual exploitation.
• The first level of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents that in some cases leads
to human trafficking takes place in the settlements in the outskirts of Asuncion: i) young
girls and adolescent girls are forced to live as a couple; ii) Forms of delivery of children and
adolescents for purposes of sexual exploitation; iii) children and adolescents exploited in
the city; iv) Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in the river circuit used for extractive industries; v) Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents within a context of life
on the streets, and vi) children and adolescents sexually exploited by procurers.
• The penetration of extractive industries into the domain of sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents is most felt in the cities in diverse departments of Paraguay. As a matter of
fact, at a second territorial level, one finds the sexually exploited children and adolescents
living in settlements in intermediate cities based around extractive production, settlements
69
exhibiting intense dynamics of migration from countryside to city, an activity increasing in
the center of capital cities and middle sized cities in the country’s different departments,
where, as of late, native indigenous children and adolescents become the main victims of
sexual exploitation.
• In this regard, a third social-populational segment facing a worrisome situation are native
indigenous children and adolescents living in their rural places of origin, who are forced
to migrate to illegal farm settlements, ranches and urban centers. The research reveals
native indigenous children and adolescents suffering different forms of sexual exploitation
and human trafficking. To be more precise, the field work demonstrated the situation of Päi
Tavyterã native indigenous children and adolescents grouped in countless communities in
the department of Amambay. In their villages, we were able to identify a series of situations
of sexual exploitation. a) Sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents by
people who are not native indigenous; b) Sexual Exploitation and trafficking of children and
adolescents by drug traffickers; c) Sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents by false religious pastors and, e) trafficking in adolescents for organ extraction. These
patterns and modes of sexual exploitation and trafficking in of children and adolescents in
Päi native indigenous peoples demonstrate the role played by mobster capitalism.
• A fourth segment highlights at least three type situations of sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents located in national border areas (with Brazil and Argentina):
a) Sexual Exploitation of children and adolescents in contact with border traffic; b) children
and adolescents who are used as “mules” (transporting drugs) with evidence of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents; c) International Sexual exploitation and trafficking of
children and adolescents, since the crimes are committed in the neighboring country. Undoubtedly, the contexts in national borders are characterized by movements that evidence
exchange between countries and world commerce. Further, beyond the country’s borders,
other areas are open, each with different social and economic cross-border dynamics (Paraguay-Brazil, Paraguay-Argentina), with rich bi-national social and cultural interactions and
combined with the dynamics of the small-time and large scale smugglers crossing the borders.
5. Recommendations
In the following section, we present summarized proposals regarding the path ahead for developing programs aimed at counteracting the factors produced by the social disadvantages
faced by children and adolescents, and visibly improve their social conditions as well as help
to reestablish the bonds of children and adolescents, enhance their community bonds and set
in motion effective mechanisms to fight sexual exploitation in all its forms and targets.
The need to provide attention to “Hidden” Type Situations requiring further research:
The interviews have demonstrated that there are yet many questions unsolved and which
require more research. Thus, it was evident that we have as yet to identify other types of
exploitation that take place in different fields. Sexual exploitation and human trafficking in
children and adolescents are crimes enabled by the anonymity of the perpetrators, especially
when the minor is isolated and unprotected. Victims avoid speaking openly about because
they face different circumstances that coerce them. In this regard, the interviews have identified another form of sexual exploitation targeting GLBT population, i.e. not heterosexual.
We have identified types of exploitation carried out by transsexual adults and also abuse by
70
agents of the police.
Not only was evidence revealed of a growing amount of concern related to organ trafficking
and marihuana plantations encroaching approximately fifty Päi communities – the latter which
victimizes Päi children and adolescents and forces them into labor and sexual exploitation,
but we also found very detailed clues – though referring to an isolated case – of sexual exploitation and human trafficking of children and adolescents within institutions. One can only
wonder how many of these cases exist. Notwithstanding the evidence on sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents in jails and, lately, centers to provide attention to refugees who
have been evacuated because of floods, the research unearthed the case of a very young girl
who had been sexually exploited and trafficked with in an inpatient healthcare institution. This
demonstrates the need to perform more research in order to find and fight covert situations
of sexual exploitation, disguised under the veil of normality of institutional fronts.
Challenges for an alternative approach in policies addressing the Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents
Currently, sexual exploitation is one of the main problems facing children and adolescents
and this issue deserves the greatest amount possible of attention at the national level. If the
goal is to eliminate sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents, the issue
should not be addressed as an isolate process, since trafficking and sexual exploitation are the
results of a complex interaction of factors. Exclusion, hidden hunger and family dysfunction
deprive children of a life lived with dignity.
The report reveals the difficult situations faced by our youngest generations as well as type
situations of sexual exploitation. In this regard, Paraguay has a series of challenges ahead
of it to ensure compliance of the rights of children and adolescents, assume responsibilities
and concise objectives, approved with consensus and supported with corresponding budgets.
Below, we list some specific suggestions.
An economic structural transformation of the development model based on model access to
land, promotion of agrarian and rural development, execution of urban housing plans and
community improvement for settlements.
Besides these structural transformations, it is necessary to promote behavioral changes
among adults regarding children and adolescents, enhancing ethical principles and values
respecting their specific and universal rights.
It is necessary to transcend approaches considering children and adolescents as simply populations at risk, by favoring comprehensive policies and programs that rely heavily on the
active participation of these subjects by emphasizing on their needs and interests, for example, by providing solutions. This is key to have incidence in preventing and fighting sexual
exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents. In this regard, it is urgent to foster
the participation and social capital of children and adolescents in their places of residence
(sports, games, meetings, study).
Implement programs for comprehensive sexual education and provide personnel specialized
in the care of adolescents in healthcare centers.
The significant number of adolescent populations in urban and native settlements, in peasant
communities on national borders, as well as adolescents from all the specter of gender identities, requires workshops addressing health, sexual and reproductive rights issues, and an
intercultural and gender-sensitive approach.
71
It is important to substantially improve the availability of safety measures against traffickers
and people who sexually exploit minors.
It is necessary to adapt the general legislative framework. This requires an earnest political
support from the higher echelons of government, the creation of special strategies to each
policy in a manner that is more comprehensive and enforceable than what the state is doing
currently in its different levels. This requires applying policies, programs and institutional
reforms with clear-cut responsibilities that specifically respond to unsatisfied demands and
reduce discrimination. It would also mean addressing the current state of institutional disarticulation and coordinating efforts, which is possible when there is political willingness. This
would imply necessarily assigning budget to enhance the state apparatus to address sexual
exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents.
It is necessary to design territorial commitments and plans to prevent and fight sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents.
Special care must be given to cross border areas. It is important to enforce migratory legislation in place and foster cooperation between national and territorial institutions, integrating
social actors and economic sectors that gravitate towards the border.
Establish support networks from local governments and civil society to sensitize the population regarding sexual exploitation and trafficking of children and adolescents and, simultaneously, disseminate information for adults and social sectors, favoring social sectors and
communities not yet organized.
We hold these as some of the basic challenges yet ahead. It is the time to move forward
in creating authentic comprehensive policies and programs to fight sexual exploitation and
human trafficking, involving different sectors, public and private actors, as well as society in
general in each territory.
Asunción - Paraguay, Octuber, 2015.
72
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76
PERÚ
INVESTIGATION
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN AND
ADOLESCENTS IN FOUR REGIONS OF PERU
(CUSCO,LORETO, UCAYALI Y DISTRITOS
PERIURBANOS DE LIMA)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
LIMA - PERÚ
2015
INDEX
1. Introduction
2. Context where the study took place
3. Methodology
4. Main findings
5. Conclusions and Recommendations
78
INVESTIGACTION
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN AND
ADOLESCENTS IN FOUR REGIONS OF PERU
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1. Introduction
Though the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents has been broadly studied in Peru,
its true dimensions have not yet been discerned precisely.
This is one of the components of the problem of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents: Its numbers are invisible, since we ignore the number of minors forced into sexual
exploitation (SE), and its dark figures probably surpass the estimates of last decade’s 10
thousand victims.
On the other hand, there is little will to expose the existence of Sexual Exploitation of Children
and Adolescents, and this happens at all levels: From the police stations, where police officers
refuse to accept reports from concerned parents when their teenage sons and daughters do
not return home to sleep, to the offices of officials from public institutions who would rather
not see this problem in their regions for it might result in decreasing its status as tourist attraction.
CHS Alternativo implements projects to fight sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
and human trafficking, considering the differences in the causes, the modus operandi of those
responsible and the effects on the victims of both these crimes. In the frame of the project
“Building bridges in the fight against commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking of minors
in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay and Peru” carried out this study in four regions of the
country: Cusco, Loreto, Ucayali and four peri-urban districts representative of Lima Este, Lima
Norte and Lima Sur, in the capital of Peru.
The purpose of this study is to help dimension, from a quali-quantitative perspective, the
situation of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents y the areas of the study as well
as to contribute to determine the voids and inconsistencies in the registry of cases of sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents by institutions responsible for control actions and
punishment of this crime.
79
The findings of this study are presented in three sections. In the first section, we focus on
the profile of the actors and the drama and crime of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents: The underage victims of sexual exploitation, the profile of their families and the
perpetrators of the crime, in other words, the exploiters. The second section describes the
dynamics of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in the contexts of study: Its scenarios, modes and how victims are induced into SE. Also, it presents an estimate of the number of victims of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents at the national level, based
on a quantitative analysis of the date in judicialized cases and other data relevant for this
purpose. The third section attempts to answer the following question: Why is sexual exploitation of children and adolescents invisible in Peru? The answers are searched in the framework
of current legislation, in the records of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents cases,
among the operators working on the issue and the intersectorial articulation between public institutions and civil society organizations addressing the issue. Finally, we present the
conclusions and Recommendations for public policies on sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents in Peru.
2. Context where the study took place
Peru’s population has been estimated by the National Institute for Statistics (INEI for its acronym in Spanish, Instituto Nacional de Estadística e Informática6) at 31,151,643 inhabitants,
as of June of 2015. Though it was qualified as a country of middle level income, it still has
situations of social inequality, whereas the mountain ranges and jungles are the areas with
greatest poverty levels.
Cusco is a region located in the southern oriental area. It is the most important tourist
center in the country, for its proximity to Machu Pichu. At June, 2015, INEI had estimated a
population of 1 ,316,729 inhabitants. The rates of poverty in the provinces of Cusco oscillate
between 18.2% and 24.7% .
Loreto is located in the Amazon jungle. Its capital is the city of Iquitos. According to INEI’s
estimates, its population in 2015 is of 1,039,372 inhabitants. Its poverty rate fluctuates between 35.2% and 42.6%. 25.3% of adolescents who answered the Demographic and Family
Health Survey (ENDES, Spanish acronym for Encuesta Demográfica y de Salud Familiar)
20137 were mothers or were pregnant. Domestic violence and sexual abuse are frequent
problems in their homes.
Ucayali is located in the central-oriental jungle. Its capital is the city of Pucallpa. According
to INEI’s estimates, its population in 2015 is of 495,511 inhabitants. ENDES (2013) reported that 27.3% of adolescent girls surveyed were mothers or were pregnant. According to
UNICEF (2015)8 anemia, chronic malnutrition, low levels of education and violence are problems affecting children and adolescents in this region.
Lima is the capital of Peru. Its estimated population in 2015 is of 9,838,251 inhabitants.
Since the end of the 1940’s, the conditions of poverty and the search for chances for development motivated populations from the mountain ranges towards Lima: They invaded sand
flats and hills and erected their homes there. These peri-urban populations became districts,
creating Lima Este, Lima Norte and Lima Sur. Out of these, the study selected four repre6
Instituto Nacional de Estadística e Informática (INEI). Population surveys 2000 to 2015. http://proyectos.
inei.gob.pe/web/poblacion/
7
Instituto Nacional de Estadística e Informática (INEI) (2014). Peru: Encuesta Demográfica y de Salud
Familiar – ENDES 2013 Nacional y Departamental. Survey. http://www.inei.gob.pe/media/MenuRecursivo/publicaciones_digitales/Est/Lib1151/index.html
8
http://www.unicef.org/peru/spanish/media_26569.htm
80
sentative districts: Carabayllo and Comas, located in Lima Norte; San Juan de Lurigancho,
in Lima Este; and Villa María del Triunfo, in Lima Sur. The population of these four districts
results in a total of 2,366,720; San Juan de Lurigancho is a district whose population exceeds
one million inhabitants.
A common element to most of the families of adolescents enduring SE in certain neighborhoods in Iquitos and rural areas of Cusco and Ucayali, is their situation of poverty or extreme
poverty, their unsatisfied basic needs, their low level of education and limited development
opportunities.
A second group of families in the cities of Cusco, Iquitos and Pucallpa, and from the four
districts studied in Lima belong to emerging sectors with satisfied basic needs: Both parents
work (or at least the mother does in single parent homes), but their resources are limited
and these do not allow them to purchase the luxury items their kids long to possess. One
can observe cases of neglect that result in their sons or daughters joining juvenile gangs or
neglecting school, returning home late at night after going to parties or night clubs and fall
prey to sexual exploitation, lured by their peers who spark their expectations of consumption
in exchange for “easy money”.
Trans9 adolescents are generally thrown out of their house in their teen years, when their
feminization becomes evident. Homosexual teens, in some cases, escape their homes as
a result of the violence they suffer from their fathers and male brothers, as a result of the
former´s condition. In both cases, they do not finish their high school education, they have
no job training and, thus, they easily fall prey to being sexually abused by “friends” who shelter them and give them food.
3. Methodology of the study
The study is descriptive and exploratory; it combines the use of quantitative and qualitative
methods, using a triangulation strategy to perform the final analysis of the results.
Its specific strategic objectives are:
1. Determine the number of judicialized sexual exploitation of children and adolescents cases
in the last three years in the regions of Cusco, Lima, Loreto and Ucayali10.
2. Help estimate the non-judicialized cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents,
based on crossing quantitative data provided by the government and general data from
population studies.
3. Propose public policies that address the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
problem in a comprehensive and efficient way.
9 Trans: A transgender woman, also Trans woman, is a person whose biological sex at birth corresponds to
that of a man but whose gender identity is that of a woman, in other words, she feels and lives as a woman. They
express it thus: “I am a woman locked in the body of a man”. Trans people do not necessarily undergo sexual reassignment surgery.
10
Data provided by Observatorio de la Criminalidad y Unidad de Protección y Asistencia a Víctimas y Testigos del Ministerio Público, UDAVIT, from the Ministry for Public Affairs, the Judicial Power, the National Penitentiary
Institute (Instituto Nacional Penitenciario), the Division for Invesetigation of High Technology Crimes (División de
Investigación de Delitos de Alta Tecnología DIVINDAT) ofthe National Police force of Peru, the Ministry for Womens`Issues and Vulnerable Populations (Ministerio de la Mujer y Poblaciones Vulnerables) and Center for Legal
Attention and Orientation and Psychological Attention (CALP, Centro de Atención y Orientación Legal y Psicológica)
of CHS Alternativo.
81
Two analyses were performed for the quantitative study:
1. Estimate the potential population of children and adolescents living in situations of sexual
exploitation without using data from judicialized . For this purpose, we extracted relevant
information published in government institution reports, especially from ENDES
2. 201311a performed by INEI, and these results were tabulated again according to the purposes of this study.
With this information, we performed and estimate of the population of minors living in situations of sexual exploitation; this was based on INEI´s 2013 ENDES survey.
(2) Analysis of the records of judicialized sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
cases, for which we requested information from the computer data and/or statistics departments from the institutions in charge: Observatory of Criminality and Unit for Protection and
Assistance to Victims and Witnesses of the Ministry for Public Affairs (Observatorio de la
Criminalidad y Unidad de Protección y Asistencia a Víctimas y Testigos del Ministerio Público,
MP), the National Police (PNP, for its acronym in Spanish, Policía Nacional del Perú), the Judicial Power (PJ), and National Penitentiary Institute(Instituto Nacional Penitenciario, INPE).
The quantitative information on judicialized cases of minors living in situations of SE was also
obtained from reports published from government institutions (Ministry for Women`s Issues
and Vulnerable Populations, or MIMP for its acronym in Spanish), or from studies belonging to
non-government organizations such as CHS Alternativo.
To analyze judicialized information, the frequency of cases was expressed according to the
size of the population in each area of the study, in terms of incidence per one hundred thousand inhabitants (using population data provided by INEI). The figures obtained were used
to compare trends in changes of incidence of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
in recent years.
The qualitative study took place based on mixed methodology, combining the systematization of secondary information and applying qualitative techniques to gather and analyze
primary information. To collect primary data, we developed semi-structured interview guides
with informed verbal consent.
In the four regions, we interviewed a total of 87 informants related to the issue of sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents: operators (55) from different sectors, national government officials or from regional government (11), representatives from non-government
organizations (NGOs) (11), and 10 leaders and members from community grassroots organizations (CGO).
The purpose of this study is to help dimension, from a quali-quantitative perspective, the
situation of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents y the areas of the study as well
as to contribute to determine the voids and inconsistencies in the registry of cases of sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents by institutions responsible for control actions and
punishment of this crime.
Finally, the product of qualitative analysis was integrated into the quantitative study to draft
the study report that states conclusions and recommendations to develop public policies to
fight sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in Peru.
11 INEI (2014) Encuesta Demográfica y de Salud Familiar (ENDES) 2013. Survey. http://www.inei.gob.pe/
media/MenuRecursivo/publicaciones_digitales/Est/Lib1151/index.html
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4. Main findings
Profile of the victims of sexual exploitation of children and their families
Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents mainly affects minors between 12 and 17
years. Most of them are adolescent women (approximately 80%). The percentage of male
and trans adolescents involved in homosexual exploitation is estimated to be 20%, with
greater incidence among trans adolescents.
In Cusco and Ucayali, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents affects adolescents from
rural areas who migrate to the city as well as those born in urban areas. In Iquitos, it is a
problem for adolescent women born in that city.
Adolescent girls from urban areas living in situations of SE from Cusco, Pucallpa and peri-urban district from Lima keep going to school, whereas those from Iquitos are either lagging
behind at school or have dropped out12. Generally, immigrant adolescents have not completed
their school studies.
Some adolescent girls who were victims of SE are admitted at shelters pregnant and with a
history of induced abortions. Between 10 and 50% of adolescents who have been sexually exploited in the three regions have sexually transmitted diseases. This percentage is increased
to 60% in the case of trans teens.
Most of the families of these minors living in situations of SE are dysfunctional. Their family
structures may be described as families that were never fully formed, disintegrated families,
recomposed or single parent families. In some cases, they come from extended families. Domestic violence and sexual abuse are frequent13 . The common trait among most adolescent
girls living in situations of sexual exploitation in the regions studied is the
lack of family networks that may offer care, control/guidance, support and healthy affective
spaces to their sons and daughters. This has negative consequences for their social-affective
development. This happens irrespective of the family’s social or economic status.
In Cusco, Iquitos and Pucallpa, many of the families are aware of the SE situation their adolescent daughters live in. For some parents, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
is a means to get rid of their oldest children and is a source of family income that is useful to
nurture the youngest. Sometimes, parents themselves persuade the victims from reporting
what is going on to the authorities. In other cases, parents do not know what to do or where
to go to help their children to leave this activity.
A police worker from Loreto stated that sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is
rarely reported by the victim or their families. Adolescents cover up the name of the person
exploiting them to protect him and refuse to submit themselves to the medical-legal examination. As a result of this, the attorney’s investigation is suspended and the reports are filed
away. A justice provider from Ucayali reported that only 15% of the victims from judicialized
cases accepts to submit to the medical-legal examination. Some of the reasons behind this
trend are:
- Victims do not feel they are victims. Rather, they feel the justice system is the
one violating their right to enjoy a better quality of life.
12 Capital Humano y Social Alternativo (2015). Informe de evaluación de necesidades. Report. Programa
Global SUSO II. p. 29
13 Capital Humano y Social Alternativo (2015). Informe de evaluación de necesidades. Report. Programa
Global SUSO II. p. 37
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- These girls do not feel they are subjects of law, or they have suffered so much
abuse, that they feel sexual exploitation is natural.
- Trans adolescents do not report these crimes because they lack family support,
lack identity documentation and fear they will be abused and discriminated.
The Perpetrators
A good percentage of the recruitment of urban adolescent girls for purposes of SE is in led by
their girl friends/classmates, who appeal to the formers’ attraction to luxury goods and their
desire to purchase fashionable objects (smartphones, tablets, clothing, and accessories) in
exchange for a quick sexual encounter “without consequences”.
In Cusco, young male gang members loiter close to schools to select schoolgirls to seduce,
offer drugs and lure them into SE. The boyfriend can also lure teen girls into this activity. In
the rural areas of Ucayali and Cusco, adult women or men are in charge of luring teens by
gaining the family´s trust.
The middlemen are males who contact men who live in the area or tourists in public spaces
such as vendors, shoe shiners, taxi drivers, motor car drivers, personnel working in lodging
establishments – to whom they show catalogs with photographs of teenage girls, offering
them the latters´ sexual services.
The procurers make the greatest profit out of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents,
because they charge both the client and the victim. They offer many underage girls to various
johns and receive a commission from each one. Many procurers own bars or establishments
to sexually exploit children and adolescents.
There is no single profile of the client-exploiter, as a justice official from Ucayali stated:
In the city, the clients come from all sectors: professionals, businessmen, D and
E socioeconomic sectors, since they think that “there is merchandise for every
budget”. One same establishment can offer different girls at different prices… it all
depends on the qualities and the age of the girl.
Scenarios and modes of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, especially in bars in different cities, or mining, oil, lumber camps and also in river ports in the regions studied.
The mode is as follows: Teenage women are hired as waitresses. They get paid more if they
agree to sit with the customer to convince him to drink liquor and, if she offers sexual services, they get paid even more. The owner of the establishment makes a threefold profit: He
sells more liquor, the client pays to take the teenage girl and, further, he charges the victim a
percentage of her fees. In bars in Pucallpa, male adolescents also offer themselves as “rent
boys” to customers in exchange for goods.
The streets are a space where sexual exploitation of children and adolescents takes place.
However, since 2009-2010, due to many circumstances, (greater police control in the streets
and establishments, better lighting of public areas and, especially, technological advance in
the form of smartphones, internet and social networks accessible to millions of people, particularly children and adolescents), the street stopped being the main scenario for sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents. It is misleading to believe that the sexual exploita84
tion of children and adolescents is coming under greater control, because now this crime is
less visible and, therefore, more difficult to detect, since the victims are contacted in internet
cabins or in their own homes.
However, open public spaces continue enabling this crime. Teenage and adult women, as well
as GLBTI adolescents, travelling on motorboats on the Ucayali River, offer sexual services to
travellers. In Cusco, there is SE of adolescent girls and boys during the night, in streets in
the city’s downtown area and the express way. In Pucallpa, there are homosexual and trans
adolescents contacting customers in the main square and Basadre highway. The streets of
Lima Este, Lima Norte and Lima Sur have been identified as spaces of sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents.
Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in tourism takes place especially in Iquitos,
where foreign, national citizens or local inhabitants look for male and female adolescents
for sexual purposes. In Cusco, tourist operators are discreet when discussing the topic, but
sources report sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in streets and bars in the city’s
downtown area during the night. Ucayali is not a tourist region.
Child Pornography is found in Pucallpa, Iquitos, S. Juan de Lurigancho (Lima Este) and Carabayllo (Lima Norte).
Recruitment of adolescents for SE is carried out face to face (by female peers posing as friends
or the boyfriend); sometimes ads are placed offering good payment for young people without
experience. Further, during recent years, there has been an increase in recruitment through
internet, as well as “grooming” or contact between an adult and a teenager in puberty or adolescents for purposes of sexual abuse, exploitation or child pornography. The national police
force provided interesting data on findings of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
through online networks.
Everywhere, the fee for ES is higher for younger victims, starting at 11 or 12 years. The age
range most frequently requested is between 12 to 13 years up to 16.
How many adolescents are victims of sexual exploitation?
It is not easy to estimate figures for sexual exploitation of children and adolescents due to the
conditions it takes place in, the low number of reports to the national police force or Ministry
for Public Affairs, trouble registering the cases, etc.
Estimates without using data from judicialized cases
For this purpose, a field study was carried out interviewing sexual workers. This allowed obtaining estimates for incidence of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents according to
the proportion of underage sex workers. This was complemented with information drawn from
health surveys to obtain estimates for the number of sex workers in the country and, thus,
obtain an estimate for the number of minors in SE.
For this study we drew a maximum estimated figure for the number of minors in a
POTENTIAL situation of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, based on
the ENDES survey for 2013, undertaken by INEI14, at the national level, with a sample population of 22,926 women.
In the ENDES 2013 survey, the interviewed women reported the number of sexual partners
14 INEI (2014) Encuesta Demográfica y de Salud Familiar (ENDES) 2013. Survey. http://www.inei.gob.pe/
media/MenuRecursivo/publicaciones_digitales/Est/Lib1151/index.html
85
they had had in the last 12 months. It is quite credible that the women involved in sexual
commerce would be among the group reporting a high number of sexual partners. This could
be also true of other women who, not being sex workers, had also had many sexual partners.
Out of the total of 15 to 49 year old women who were single at the moment of the interview,
1.65% (164 women) declared having two or more sexual partners in the past twelve months.
Out of this 1.65%, 24.4% (40 women) is between 15 and 19 years (interval or age group
established by ENDES 2013). Among the women between 15 a 49 years who were in a relationship at the moment of the survey, 0.52% (68 women surveyed) declared having one or
more sexual partners besides their husband/partner. Out of this group, only 5.9% (4 women)
was between 15 to 19 years.
Combining subgroups, single women and women in a relationship, the women between 15 to
49 years reporting two or more sexual partners in the past twelve months was 1.01 percent
(232 women surveyed). According to INEI15, the projected number of women between 1549 years for 2015 is 8,310,107. Thus, based on this figure, the maximum number of women
potentially involved in sexual commerce would be 83,932. We believe this percentage
and figure are maximum estimates of sex workers we could find among the 15-49
year female population, because it is a fact that not all the women in the survey who
have had two or more sexual partners in the last 12 months are involved in sexual
commerce.
ENDES-2013 disaggregates the data referring to the number of women in the survey with two
or more sexual partners according to age groups. Out of the 232 surveyed women with two
or more partners in the past twelve months, 44 of them were between the age ranges of 15
to 19, making up 19.9% of the total population. Thus, out of a total of 83,932 potential sex
workers we estimated previously as a maximum, 16,595 cases (19.9% out of 83,932) would
be the maximum number of women between the 15 to 19 age group.
The interval for 15-19 years set by ENDES 2013 includes five age groups (15 to almost 16;
16 to almost 17; 17 to almost 18; 18 to almost 19 and, finally, 19 year old women) out of
which only the three age groups are potential cases of sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents since they are underage. If we assume that 44 surveyed women in this interval
are distributed equally in each of the five age groups, (approximately 9 per group), we would
estimate that 27 women are in the 15 to almost 18 year age group (the groups including 15 to
almost 16, 16 to almost 17, and 17 to almost 18) that we can categorize as being between 15
to 17 years, and, thus, underage girls. These 27 women in the survey found in the 15 to 17
age group would be 11.94% of the entire population with two or more sexual partners. In the
year 2015, this proportion would be the equivalent of 9,957 people (11.94% out of 83,932).
Unfortunately, in real life, sexual exploitation also affects people under 15 years, a population
for which there is no direct quantitative information.16 To calculate these numbers, one alternative would be to extrapolate or extend our conclusions regarding to the potential number
of women with two or more sexual partners among the 15-19 year age group to the 10-14
year age group.
We estimate that, for 2015, the number of women between 15 to 19 years with two or more
sexual partners in the past 12 months was 16,595. INEI estimated that the total number of
15
16
http://www.inei.gob.pe/estadisticas/indice-tematico/population-estimates-and-projections/
Legislation does not allow interviewing or surveying children under 14 years.
86
women between 15 to 19 years was 1,421,872. Thus, the incidence of women with 2 or more
sexual partners in that group is 1.1671%..
If this same incidence should remain among the 10 to 14 year age group, INEI estimates
there would be 1,431,027 people; thus, we could estimate 16,702 cases in this age group.
This value is probably extreme because we could expect that the probability that an individual
is exposed to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents would increase with age. In other words, it would be less in the 10 to 14 year age group than in the 15 to 19 year age group.
. A more conservative estimate is that the statistics for having two or more sexual partners
in the 10-14 year age group are really only half of the 15-19 year age group, in other words,
8,351 cases. An even more conservative estimate is that this figure is only 1 fourth, which
would result in 4.175 cases.
Adding these values to the 10 to 14 year age group, our estimate of 9,957 women
between 15 to 17 years with two or more sexual partners would provide us estimates for the 10 to 17 year age group, a figure that would fluctuate from 14,132 to
26.659 young and adolescent girls in potential cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents .
Thus, the maximum value of 26 based on the extreme estimate that the exposition to multiple sexual contacts is similar among girls between 10 to 14 years as in adolescents between
15 and 19 years. Thus, the minimum value of 14 thousand is based on the estimate that the
exposition to diverse sexual partners among the age group of 10 to 14 years is one fourth of
the estimate for the 15 to 19 year age group. We must emphasize that the data we used from
ENDES-2013 (women surveyed who declared to have two or more sexual partners in the past
twelve months) only allows estimates representing “potential” cases of sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents, or a maximum estimate, not cases that have actually happened.
Thus, to conclude, we estimate that the number of minors between 10 to 17 years who are
POTENTIALLY exposed to possible sexual exploitation at the national level can vary somewhere between 14 to 26 thousand women in the year 2015.
Estimates using data from judicialized cases
It is difficult to provide an estimate of the number of minors living in situations of SE, using
judicialized case data for two reasons:
The minors involved and their families are reluctant to report SE situations.
The country lacks a criminal category for sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. This
makes it difficult for justice officials to analyze the cases and register them properly, because
the criminal category this would fall into – Encouraging Prostitution, Procuring and Ruffianism – make no distinction between victims who are of legal age and those who are underage.
The incidence estimates of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents from
data gathered from the national police force (PNP), the Ministry for Public Affairs
(MP), the Judicial Power (PJ) or other entities of the central government or regional
government are only based on a fraction of the cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents reported to authorities.
Unfortunately, it is possible that incidents reported to the police may not be reported at the
level of the Public Ministry, since the case did not go through the attorney due to a lack of
evidence demonstrating sexual exploitation of children and adolescents or because, for the
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police authorities, there is no criminal category for crimes of sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents.
Judicialization of a potential case of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents starts with
an action from the Ministry for Public Affairs or MP. Crime classification depends on the decsion and specification with which the criminal attorney formalizes the report. However, such
a classification generally evolves according to how the investigation develops. For example, a
case originally typified as procuring in general can later be categorized as Encouraging Prostitution and, finally, become a case of Encouraging Child Prostitution.
Further, one must take into account that the crimes related to sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents count the author of the crime (the procurer, the user/
client, etc) but not the number of victims. Thus, one “case” of Encouraging Child Prostitution could involve more than one underage boy or girl. So, statistics based on judicial
“cases” can actually sub estimate the real number of children and adolescents living
in situations of sexual exploitation.
As a result of these limitations, any quantification of police-judicial activity is measuring – quite imprecisely – two phenomena: The incidence of sexual exploitation
in minors and the registry and judicial-police processing of the reports of cases of
sexual exploitation of children and adolescents of which these institutions become
aware.
Thus, this study does not try to directly connect the non-judicial estimates with
judicial ones because they describe two phenomena that, though related, have distinct characteristics.
Ministry of Public (MP) Affairs statistics
The point of entry of potential cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents into the
judicial system of Peru is through the action of MP, through its diverse criminal attorneys’ offices. In 2014, the MP’s Observatory of Criminality (Observatorio de la Criminalidad) reported
statistics of crimes against liberty in the subcategories of procurers and Offenses Against Public Decency reported in from 2011 to 2014. The cases for crimes related to sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents reported in this period referred to Articles 179 (Encouraging Prostitution), 180 (Ruffianism), 179-A (User/client) and 181 (Procurement) of the Criminal Code.
The data provided by the Observatory of Criminality and the Unit for Protection and Assistance to Victims and Witnesses of the Ministry for Public Affairs (UDAVIT), of the MP, reveals
a disconcerting low incidence of cases due to crimes related to sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents reported to the Ministry of Public Affairs for investigation. The most frequent
cases refer to Encouraging Prostitution of minors under 18 years. The number of cases related to User—clients are extremely low at the national level (3 in 2011 and in 2012).
Thus, in conclusion, the low incidence of cases of crimes connected to sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents reported for investigation to the MP – data coherent with the very
low number of reports of SE filed by victims, family members or third parties – demonstrates
that the judicial statistics on sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, In this case, from
the Ministry for Public Affairs, only reflect a very small fraction of the estimates of children and
adolescents enduring sexual exploitation in Peru.
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN THE HOTSEAT: The invisibility
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of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in Peru
ECPAT’s Global Monitoring Reports for 200912 included statements provided by the Vice
Minister for Women’s’ Affairs, estimating 9,600 to 10,000 cases of exploitation of children
and adolescents in in the year 2006. However, Querol (2009)13 stated the cases reported by
MIMDES referred to adolescent girls admitted into MINSA centers, reports filed in DEMUNA o
CEM; in other words, these cases refer to people who had access to urban services and this
group represented a minority of the total number of cases of sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents, thus, there was an alarming number of underreported or unreported cases.
Coincidentally, our quantitative study, considering the low incidence of cases of crimes related
to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents reported to the MP for investigation exposes
the fact that judicial statistics on this crime only reflect a very small fraction of the estimates
of children and adolescents forced into sexual exploitation.
The study analyzes many conditions contributing to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents not being categorized as a crime that violates the fundamental rights of children and
adolescents.
Sexual Exploitation of Children And Adolescents According to National Legislation
Peruvian legal framework protects the rights of children and adolescents and the government
has subscribed international agreements and treaties that also protect them. For example:
The Code of Rights of Children and Adolescents (Código de los Derechos de los Niños y Adolescentes) (Law No. 27337)17 considers prostitution as an extreme violation against their
personal integrity. Based on this legal framework, the Peruvian government has developed
public policies and action plans to prevent and fight against sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents.
Expected Result No. 14 (Resultado Esperado 14) stated in the National Action Plan for Children and Adolescents 2012-202113 (Plan Nacional de Acción por la Infancia y la Adolescencia)
states as an indicator: “The number of adolescents separated from situations of SE.” However,
it does not have a baseline that would allow assessing fulfillment of the indicator. In other
words, the invisibility of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents hinders knowing its
current magnitude and makes it difficult to evaluate actions leading to this proposed objective.
As for Peruvian criminal legislation, Law No. 28251 has categorized crimes related to sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents: Encouraging Prostitution, User-Client, Ruffianism,
procurers, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in Tourism, Dissemination in media
encouraging crimes against the sexual liberty of minors and obscene displays and publications
– child pornography. However, there is no sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
crime categorized as such in a specific article, as is the case for human trafficking.
These related criminal categories make it difficult to conceptualize sexual exploitation of children and adolescents for justice providers and hinders a disaggregated record contemplating
the number of victims of legal age and minors (as in the case of Ruffianism). This limitation
can be seen in the statistics provided by the Judicial Power, which do not distinguish if the SE
victim is of legal age or underage, thus, thwarting the estimation of cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
17
Código de los Derechos de los Niños y Adolescentes) (Law No.27337 (2000).
http://www2.congreso.gob.pe/sicr/cendocbib/con2_uibd.nsf/77150A0364D1D78D052577850060F059/$FILE/CODIGO_DE_LOS_NI%C3%91OS_Y_ADOLESCENTES.pdf
89
Thus, in spite of a legal framework defending the rights of minors forced into SE, for
Peruvian legislation, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents does not exist,
since there is a void no definition for it in the criminal code and, further, it remains
hidden behind connected criminal categories.
Registering cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
To file a report of a case of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, it would be necessary to formally file the case. And this is the greatest hindrance when doing so, because
most of the cases are not reported either by the victims or their families. A second obstacle
may be found in the police system, which lacks trained workers to detect the cases that could
be reported. Further, filing such a report would also be hindered by the absence of a criminal definition for sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. Thus, the cases of sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents that do make it into the system are not reported as
such, and, thus, the victim does not receive proper attention.
Ministry of Public (MP) Affairs statistics
According to the Ministry’s statistics, in Peru there is an extremely low incidence of cases
of crimes related to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents reported to the Ministry
of Public Affairs. This figure is always under 0.5 per 100 thousand inhabitants, a low figure
compared to other crimes. To understand how comparatively low this estimate is, the World
Bank has reported that, in 2012, Peru had a certain number of homicides – 10 per 100 thousand inhabitants –. Homicide is a crime considered much less frequent than crimes of sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents, but usually it is more reported.18
These comparisons reinforce the perceptions held by specialists that sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is an extremely underrepresented phenomenon for police and judicial authorities in Peru.
A second aspect that we can garner from the MP statistics is the notorious differences between the regions in the country. For example, it seems that in Cusco there is a trend
where cases of crimes related to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents reported by MP is decreasing, whereas in Loreto, especially in Ucayali, this occurrence has
notably increased in 2013 and 2014. In those years, the regions in Loreto, and especially
Ucayali, there was a number of recorded cases of procuring and Encouraging Prostitution of
Minors that far exceeded the national average.
Statistics from the Judicial Power (PJ)
The statistics provided by the judicial power classify the cases not only according to the type
of crime committed but also by the state of the penal process found in the case. Annual statistics, therefore, can include cases started many years before and which are still in the judicial system. Since the data only includes information from the years 2012 and 2013, it is not
possible to draw a trend in the change of numbers per crimes related to sexual exploitation of
children and adolescents by the Judicial Power.
18 http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/VC.IHR.PSRC.P5
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In the case of procurers, Encouraging Prostitution and Ruffianism, the PJ statistics do not distinguish between victims of legal age and minors. This seriously affects the estimates of cases
of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
In the term of 2012-2013, the Judicial Power had around 5,185 and 4,699 cases
(ratios or proportions of 17,204 and 15,419 cases per one hundred thousand inhabitants) related to encouraging the prostitution of minors. The number of cases
classified under other types of crimes is much less.
The very low number of people convicted for crimes related to sexual exploitation
of children and adolescents is remarkable: 170 between 1996-2014. This figure represents an extremely small number of the penal population in the country between these
years. This demonstrates that sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is a crime that
is rarely punished and most of its perpetrators remain free.
Registering cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in the Health
Sector
In the Health Sector, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents does not factor as a case
included in the HIS1516 information system, as reported by the Ministry for Women’s’ Issues
and Vulnerable Populations19:
Regional and Local Health Offices have no records whose indicators could report cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents…”
This report from the Health Sector, stating it either has no information regarding sexual exploitation of children and adolescents or such cases are under recorded is very serious, because it deprives the victims from receiving comprehensive attention for their recovery and
social reinsertion.
Officials addressing sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
In over fifty interviews to officials working on cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in different sectors (justice, health, education, shelters, municipal advocacy centers,
emergency centers for women), we can see variations in their level of knowledge and interest on this issue. One of the problems we have found is that not all workers are trained and
there is also a high degree of fluctuation in their numbers. These factors hinder efficient and
sustainable treatment of these crimes. The coordination level between officials in different
sectors within the regions studied is also variable and with differing degrees of effectiveness.
Articulation between government institutions and civil society organizations against
sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is an issue with multiple causes, responding
to factors conditioning it (for example, poverty), determine it (dysfunctional family dynamics
and the interest of the exploiters) and sustain it (for example, demand, social tolerance and
impunity). Thus, it requires concerted cooperation from all the spheres in order to provide
solutions from their own specific approaches and from all the officials involved according to
their specific expertise.
19
Ministerio de la Mujer y Poblaciones Vulnerables. Plan Nacional de Acción por la Infancia y la Adolescencia.
Informe sobre la problemática de niñas, niños y adolescentes en explotación sexual 2011-2013. Report p. 33
91
For some regions included in this study, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is not
seen as a problem in itself but rather as a manifestation of human trafficking. Thus, Multisectorial work and action plans are defined according to the issue of human trafficking, among
which some activities or tasks referring to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents take
place. Such is the case of the regions of Ucayali and Cusco.
In Loreto, though sexual exploitation of children and adolescents and human trafficking are
addressed together – the Regional Work Group for Prevention, Attention and Punishment of
human Trafficking and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents (Mesa Regional para
Prevención, Atención y Sanción de Casos de Trata de Personas y (ESNNAtheir Regional Action
Plan against human trafficking and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents for 20132017 differentiates these in the definition provided for some activities, such as providing attention to sexual exploitation victims.
There are spaces that consider sexual exploitation of children and adolescents as a problem
in itself and address it thus. Such is the case of Villa María del Triunfo, in Lima Sur. In 2011,
NGO representatives and state and local institutions from four districts of Lima Sur, together
with the Municipality of Lima Metropolitan Area, created the Interdistrict Committee to fight
sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in Lima Sur (Comité Interdistrital de Lucha
frente a la ESNNA en Lima Sur). As part of their work plan, they developed important initiatives to fight sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in these four districts.
In the district of Comas (Lima Norte), the experience of multisectorial cooperation decreased
and now efforts are being made to restart it. Important steps were taken there with the leaders of the Multisectorial Committee for the Rights of Children and Adolescents (Comité Multisectorial por los Derechos del Niño y Adolescente), composed by representatives of state,
local institutions and civil society organizations. Unfortunately, the process stopped due to
the unwillingness demonstrated by the new district authority during the term of 2011-2014
and the withdrawal of the NGOs who concluded their projects. Currently, the new municipal
authority looks to reactivate this multisectorial cooperation.
In the district of Carabayllo (Lima Norte), there is an initial development concerning multisectorial cooperation, based on the program Casa Amiga, created in 2012, involving the management spheres of the municipality’s Social Development Office. They are promoting a municipal
ordinance against human trafficking and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.
Society and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents
There is a consensus between informers that the population’s attitude regarding sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is one of indifference. Sexual exploitation of children
and adolescents is seen as natural, an incident that does not draw attention. it is tolerated
and allowed; people prefer not to get involved but rather “let it be, let it pass”.
Thus, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents seems nonexistent. And such an attitude represents a complicit silence facing the victim’s problem and the crime committed.
Conclusions and Recommendations
Analyzing the study’s findings, we conclude that:
Quantitative analysis estimates that, at the national level, the number of minors between 10
to 17 years who are possibly exposed to possible sexual exploitation in 2015 varies some92
where between 14 to 26 thousand women.
Quantitative information collected from the Ministry for Public Affairs suggests the incidence
of cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is substantially higher in Loreto,
especially in Ucayali, compared to other regions in the country. And this figure increased
markedly in recent years (2013 and 2014). However, in Cusco, there seems to be a downward
trend in the incidence of cases of crimes related to sexual exploitation of children and adolescents reported by the Ministry.
The inexistence of a criminal legislative definition of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents as a category in itself and connected penal definitions make it difficult for justice
providers to conceptualize it, and, thus, hinders the precise reporting of cases of SE of underage victims. This leads to obscure the true dimension of sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents.
The analysis of the records of cases provided by the Ministry of Public Affairs, the Judicial Power, the National Penitentiary Institute and the national police force demonstrate that sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents is an extremely underreported phenomenon among
police and judicial authorities. This demonstrates that sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is a crime that is rarely punished and most of its perpetrators remain free.
At the level of the families of the victims, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is
the result of deprivations, but not just of financial poverty. The families of SE victims display
dysfunctions and affective voids that do not allow creating solid bonds that offer nurturance,
control/guidance, support and healthy affective spaces for their daughters and sons. Thus,
their social-affective development is compromised. This happens irrespective of the family’s
social or economic status.
Sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is a problem deriving from multiple factors.
Thus, it requires concerted cooperation from all the spheres in order to provide solutions from
their own specific approaches and from all the officials involved according to their specific
expertise.
Given these conclusions, we propose the following policy recommendations:
The definition of a criminal legislation figure for sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. One such definition exists for human trafficking, thus there should be one for the aforementioned crime.
The existence of a single registry for cases of this crime for the Judicial Power and Ministry
for Public Affairs that allows having one unified single file validated by both these sectors. A
policy to improve data gathering will need an improved definition of the crime of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents and training of the operators in charge of the registry.
The creation of specialized units to address sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in
the national police force, the Ministry for Public Affairs and the Judicial Power.
Undertake a sustained effort for political incidence among state, regional and local authorities
to keep the issue on their agenda, Foster their commitment to support such efforts and design
policies addressing sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. This will ensure continuity
to the efforts independently of any changes that might occur from the periodic renewal of
authorities.
93
Ensure intersectorial commitment to work regularly on sexual exploitation of children and
adolescents from national, regional, local spheres, since these are supposed to be in charge
of providing sustainability to such actions.
Provide officials and workers involved in the issue (in the fields of justice, health, DEMUN,
CEM, shelters, education, tourist services, among others) with proper sensitization and training workshops on sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. Efforts should be made to
not only reach high management but also include operations personnel. Promote continuity
in these efforts, better yet, include the topic in professional training programs, especially in
institutions with high staff rotation (national police force, justice and health workers).
Portray the true dimensions of the issue and increase awareness on sexual exploitation of children and adolescents and its consequences for the victims by placing it in the public agenda
in order to fight social complacency towards the problem.
Involve specialists in tutorship and teachers through the education sector in actions to prevent sexual exploitation of children and adolescents aimed at parents and school children and
teenagers.
Increase municipal ordinances to sanction commercial establishments that allow the entry of
minors without the company of their parents or tutors. Furthermore, punish internet cabins
and places where child pornography is exhibited.
Lima-Perú, Octuber, 2015
94
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