Daniel Pedersen

The Courier Mail

August 10, 2002

By: Daniel Pedersen, Steve Sandford

Foreign paedophiles are preying on Cambodia’s young people, report Daniel Pedersen and Steve Sandford

PK and Big Je d say they are in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, because they dig the people.

They say, as another tray of 12 tequila shots arrives at the table, that they are sorry they were a part of an American force that seemed hell-bent on destroying the place in their younger years.

And now they are here to make amends, to get to know the people.

But as more drinks are consumed, it is obvious they have travelled to this South-East Asian country on a quest for cheap sex.

The pair of ex-servicemen then begin to talk of the Vietnamese quarter, Svey Pak, on the outskirts of town.

There women sell sex for a few US dollars, 50 cents even.

“Jesus Christ, some of those places have girls that will do anything, young girls I mean, for 10 freaking dollars,” says PK, as he tips his head back and wipes the tequila from his chin.

He doesn’t realise he’d been ripped off.

Sex is a national business in Cambodia, and the lawlessness of the wrecked country attracts all sorts, in particular paedophiles.

It is often the last stop of the sexual pervert’s world tour — where international law enforcement agencies finally track him down.

So it was recently for former rock star Gary Glitter, who came to the attention of immigration authorities when discovered living in Phnom Penh. Glitter has been tried and convicted in the United Kingdom on child pornography charges.

He had moved on, and he was found, much to his displeasure.

Word has it he is now in Cuba – maybe?

The case seems to have marked the beginning of something.

In the past four weeks a spate of arrests has tallied five cases involving foreigners and alleged sexual abuse of minors.

But there had been indications that things were set for change.

Rudolph Knuckel, a Swiss businessman, was indicted on January 28, 2000, for alleged sex acts with multiple minors.

He also happened to own a travel and tour agency.

He was the first foreigner incarcerated since anyone began to take notice of Cambodia’s child prostitution problem.

His arrest made headlines worldwide.

Briton John Keeler was jailed for three years in 2000, for making pornographic videos of two girls, aged 10 and 11.

He flew into a rage when found guilty and fined $US5000.

An Italian was arrested this week, and the Government has just announced charges pending against a Briton.

This month another Italian, Alain Filipo Berruti, was jailed for sex acts with three young boys on the banks of the Tonle Sap, the river that hugs the uptown sector of the capital.

And now two Australians, teachers no less, have been arrested — Bart Lauwaert, 36, and Rex Clint Betteridge, 35 — and charged with debauchery.

The charges are yet to be heard by a court.

The United Nations says, with its usual clarity, that because of the illicit nature of the trade, it is difficult to say how many children are involved in the sex industry. However, the UN is prepared to quote private organisations as estimating that 30 to 35 per cent of all sex workers in Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Burma and Laos are aged between 12 and 17-years-old.

The age of consent in Cambodia is 15.

Last year UNICEF executive director Carol Bellamy said: “Each year, millions of children — boys as well as girls — are bought and sold like fresh produce, commodities in a global sex industry steeped in greed and unspeakable cruelty.” UNICEF estimates that every year, one million youths aged less than 18 are forced into the sex trade.

A UNICEF delegate to a conference in Yokohama in December last year, Louis-Deorges Arsenault, said child prostitution networks were able to act with “impunity” in Cambodia.

“Traffickers can abduct children easily and with impunity from the villages and take them to Phnom Penh or Thailand, by threatening or killing any police who dare to try to stop them,” Mr Arsenault said.

Cambodian Women’s Crisis Centre director Chantol Oueng says the laws have to be drastically changed because foreigners are coming, committing offences, and then being allowed to leave unprosecuted.

Her organisation spearheaded the investigation that led to the raid on Knuckel’s home and his eventual arrest.

Knuckel’s case investigators have since said he has arranged house arrest, citing a heart condition, and has been seen frequenting bars where certain services can be arranged.

Siem Reap, until recently, has been a hotbed of child sex abuse.

Yet now, after the burial of the Khmer Rouge and renewed interest in the Angkor Wat, the ancient stone temple system considered a wonder of the modern world, international flights are more regular.

Things are beginning to change — the flights deliver foreigners with Western attitudes and little tolerance for human rights abuses.

That is positive.

Yet tonight, along the banks of the Tonle Sap, and in the shadows of the lights of uptown Phnom Penh, the shoe shine boys will gather in the capital at dusk.

There they will spend the night, possibly entertaining a foreigner who has come with a pocketful of US dollars.

ENDS