By Mata Press Service
The Asian Pacific Post
The arrest of an English teacher from Canada for allegedly attempting to have sex with a 13-year-old Cambodia beggar girl has once again put the spotlight on the child sex tourism in the poor Asian nation.
The arrest has also prompted calls by anti-child sex trade activists to charge the man under Canada’s child sex tourism laws, which has only been used once before. “We are calling on the Canadian government to investigate the serious allegation against this individual, and if they are substantiated to lay charges under Canada’s child sex tourism laws,” said Sabrina Sullivan, Managing Director of The Future Group.
The Cambodian Daily reported that Richard Beaulac, a 35-year-old man from Quebec has been charged in Cambodia with the attempted rape of a 13 year-old girl, who was a street beggar.
It said that Beaulac entered Cambodia on January 1 and has been working in the tourist town of Siem Reap as an English teacher.
Beaulac allegedly picked up the 13-year old girl and three other female street children and took them back to his apartment, according to Sun Bunthang, provincial anti-human trafficking police chief.
Beaulac allegedly sent three of the girls away before molesting the remaining girl, and told police that he and the girl lay naked on the bed but denies molesting her. The girl is currently in the care of the Cambodia Women’s Crisis Centre.
Beaulac has been charged by the Siem Reap Provincial Court with attempted rape.
“Child sex tourists cause irreparable harm to young children abroad and drive the multi-million dollar human trafficking industry,” said Sullivan,
“Canada needs to ensure that it is part of the solution.”
Only one person has ever been charged under Bill C-27 and C-15, Amendments to Canadian Criminal Code criminalizing child sex tourism.
That prosecution of Donald Bakker in Vancouver is largely considered accidental, since it only came out during the course of an investigation for offences in Canada.
Bakker, a 44 year former employee of the Pan Pacific Hotel, plead guilty to committing sexual acts against seven Asian girls between the ages of seven and 12 in a Cambodian brothel.
He also plead guilty to three charges of attacking prostitutes in Vancouver. He was sentenced to jail for seven years after spending 18 months in custody.
The seven Asian girls involved in the Bakker case are now in the hands of the aid agency World Vision and going to school.
The precise scale of Cambodia’s sex trade is difficult to quantify. International organizations -- such as UNICEF, ECPAT and Save the Children -- say that anywhere from from 50,000 to 100,000 women and children are involved. An estimated 30 percent of the sex workers in Phnom Penh are under the age of 18, according to the United Nations. The actual figure may be much higher, activists say.
Around the world, more than 1 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade each year, according to the U.S. State Department. The State Department believes Cambodia is a key transit and destination point in this trade.
For its part, Canada has been playing an active role to combat the child sex trade in Cambodia. But activists feel that if Beaulac is charged under the Bill C-27 and C-15, it will serve as a warning to Canadian sex tourists.
After the Bakker case was resolved, outgoing Vancouver police Chief Jamie Graham announced that one of the department’s top sex crime investigators would be going to Cambodia to gather intelligence on Canadian pedophiles preying on children.
The officer was to set up a network in Cambodia with non-governmental organizations and other agencies to assist in tracking Canadian pedophiles.
Meanwhile, a new parliamentary report released in Ottawa said Canada should create a new “counter-trafficking office” to step up efforts to combat the “most heinous of crimes” – the international trade of women and children for sexual exploitation. A 2005 report on human trafficking by the U.S. State department said Canada was both a destination and a transit point for women and children trafficked from Central and South America, Eastern Europe and Asia for sexual exploitation.
It cited estimates from the RCMP in 2004 that 800 people a year are brought into Canada, and that between 1,500 and 2,200 others are moved through Canada into the United States.
The arrest has also prompted calls by anti-child sex trade activists to charge the man under Canada’s child sex tourism laws, which has only been used once before. “We are calling on the Canadian government to investigate the serious allegation against this individual, and if they are substantiated to lay charges under Canada’s child sex tourism laws,” said Sabrina Sullivan, Managing Director of The Future Group.
The Cambodian Daily reported that Richard Beaulac, a 35-year-old man from Quebec has been charged in Cambodia with the attempted rape of a 13 year-old girl, who was a street beggar.
It said that Beaulac entered Cambodia on January 1 and has been working in the tourist town of Siem Reap as an English teacher.
Beaulac allegedly picked up the 13-year old girl and three other female street children and took them back to his apartment, according to Sun Bunthang, provincial anti-human trafficking police chief.
Beaulac allegedly sent three of the girls away before molesting the remaining girl, and told police that he and the girl lay naked on the bed but denies molesting her. The girl is currently in the care of the Cambodia Women’s Crisis Centre.
Beaulac has been charged by the Siem Reap Provincial Court with attempted rape.
“Child sex tourists cause irreparable harm to young children abroad and drive the multi-million dollar human trafficking industry,” said Sullivan,
“Canada needs to ensure that it is part of the solution.”
Only one person has ever been charged under Bill C-27 and C-15, Amendments to Canadian Criminal Code criminalizing child sex tourism.
That prosecution of Donald Bakker in Vancouver is largely considered accidental, since it only came out during the course of an investigation for offences in Canada.
Bakker, a 44 year former employee of the Pan Pacific Hotel, plead guilty to committing sexual acts against seven Asian girls between the ages of seven and 12 in a Cambodian brothel.
He also plead guilty to three charges of attacking prostitutes in Vancouver. He was sentenced to jail for seven years after spending 18 months in custody.
The seven Asian girls involved in the Bakker case are now in the hands of the aid agency World Vision and going to school.
The precise scale of Cambodia’s sex trade is difficult to quantify. International organizations -- such as UNICEF, ECPAT and Save the Children -- say that anywhere from from 50,000 to 100,000 women and children are involved. An estimated 30 percent of the sex workers in Phnom Penh are under the age of 18, according to the United Nations. The actual figure may be much higher, activists say.
Around the world, more than 1 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade each year, according to the U.S. State Department. The State Department believes Cambodia is a key transit and destination point in this trade.
For its part, Canada has been playing an active role to combat the child sex trade in Cambodia. But activists feel that if Beaulac is charged under the Bill C-27 and C-15, it will serve as a warning to Canadian sex tourists.
After the Bakker case was resolved, outgoing Vancouver police Chief Jamie Graham announced that one of the department’s top sex crime investigators would be going to Cambodia to gather intelligence on Canadian pedophiles preying on children.
The officer was to set up a network in Cambodia with non-governmental organizations and other agencies to assist in tracking Canadian pedophiles.
Meanwhile, a new parliamentary report released in Ottawa said Canada should create a new “counter-trafficking office” to step up efforts to combat the “most heinous of crimes” – the international trade of women and children for sexual exploitation. A 2005 report on human trafficking by the U.S. State department said Canada was both a destination and a transit point for women and children trafficked from Central and South America, Eastern Europe and Asia for sexual exploitation.
It cited estimates from the RCMP in 2004 that 800 people a year are brought into Canada, and that between 1,500 and 2,200 others are moved through Canada into the United States.
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