Child prostitution: The scourge of Colombia’s mines
Child prostitution: The scourge of Colombia’s mines
By: JINETH BEDOYA LIMA | 25 de Mayo del 2013
These girls are sexually exploited in the center of Medellin.
Some mines are organized networks of human trafficking.
Her days are filled with (sniffing) glue, inhaling it to forget her hunger, abuse by her clients and long hours with drunk miners and assailants in clandestine camps located on the lower Atrato, between Murindó (Antioquia) and Carmen del Darién (Chocó).
In these ancestral lands of the Embera tribe, copper and gold aren't the only things being exploited. There are young bodies which haven't even reached maturity yet, which are also being traded, by human trafficking networks, into forced prostitution and sexual exploitation. But it is not the only thing. El Tiempo documented how wherever the mines are located, criminals groups mounted a side business that is not limited to extortion and deforestation.
Hidden behind the titles of all the articles about mining that have generated so much controversy in the past year, illegal mining and the use of the armed groups to maintain their funding source, there's a crime that no one has attacked and for many regions this crime is almost part of the landscape. Officials say that where there are many men, there's prostitution, and since that's the world's oldest profession, there's no cause for alarm.
But the truth is that dozens of girls under the age of 16 have been sexually enslaved and today are part of a statistic, an unclear number. This lack of clarity goes hand in hand with the total absence of a government plan to save them from exploitation.
...
After a journey of several days, in the March 2011, Mireya was gathered with 11 other children. Remember that "one of them had just turned nine years old and was still speaking a half tongue", the five who were virgins were separated from the group and on Saturday night were given to four miners. "They were more or less old. First we were given brandy and then ... it began. " No tears. This child's words are full of hopelessness only.
An illicit, suffering
...
http://www.eltiempo.com/justicia/explotacion-sexual-de-ninas-en-zonas-mineras_12824463-4 (Spanish)
Mobile brothels. Children. Forced at gunpoint to perform any number of aberrant acts. Their "wages" stolen to pay for their "room and board". No help from the state. "in recent months has affected a number of indigenous communities, as their girls are over exploited".
"coltan extraction has also unleashed a wave of sexual exploitation". The police says it's the army's responsibility, the army says they're not competent to manage children and pass the ball (where?).
An illicit, suffering
Here's an unrelated picture of a pretty Embera girls
