LONDON: British MPs probing sexual abuse in the international charity sector are investigating an unpublished UN report from 2001 naming 15 major aid organizations implicated in a “sex-for-food” scandal, The Times newspaper reported on Tuesday.
The charities were listed in a probe by UN and Save the Children officials who collected testimony from children in West Africa that aid workers had traded food for sex, according to the newspaper.
The Times obtained a copy of the 84-page report which is now also in the hands of lawmakers.
The UN released a summary of the investigation in 2002 but the full report naming the agencies was never made public. It has now been passed to the British parliament’s international development committee, the newspaper said.
MPs are probing the aid sector following revelations earlier this year of a prostitution scandal in Haiti involving staff from British charity Oxfam.
The report had found dozens of workers for more than 40 NGOs — including 15 international organizations — were “alleged to be in sexually exploitative relationships with refugee children,” according to The Times.
The list of implicated personnel were from UN agencies and other organizations in the sector, such as the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), it reported.
NRC said in a statement it had taken the report “very seriously” and followed up with its own investigation “resulting in the firing of one national staff member in Sierra Leone.”
The investigating researchers found aid workers in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia were “among the prime sexual exploiters of refugee children,” trading food, oil, access to education and plastic sheeting for sex.
They reported the allegations could not be fully verified and required further investigation.
“The number of allegations documented, however, is a critical indicator of the scale of the problem,” the researchers reportedly warned.
Ruud Lubbers, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees from 2001 to 2005, at the time rejected the possibility of child sexual abuse by members of his own staff as “gossip.”
However the UNHCR wrote to all the organizations referenced in the report, detailing the unproven allegations, and sent investigators from UN headquarters.
They identified 43 separate abuse accusations in the region, which had led it to initiate “specific preventive and remedial actions,” The Times said.
However, of 67 people who were referred to UNHCR officials in “confidential lists,” fewer than 10 were dismissed and none was prosecuted, the paper added.
UK MPs probe unpublished UN ‘sex-for-food’ findings: report
UK MPs probe unpublished UN ‘sex-for-food’ findings: report
- The UN released a summary of the investigation in 2002
- The full report naming the agencies was never made public
Philippines, US, Japanese planes drill over Bashi Channel
- Aircraft from the three nations patrolled over the Philippines’ northernmost Batanes islands in drills aimed at showcasing their “ability to operate seamlessly together in complex maritime environments,” the Philippine military said in a statement
MANILA: The Philippine, US and Japanese militaries conducted joint exercises this week over the Bashi Channel that separates the Philippines from Taiwan, officials said Friday.
Aircraft from the three nations patrolled over the Philippines’ northernmost Batanes islands in drills aimed at showcasing their “ability to operate seamlessly together in complex maritime environments,” the Philippine military said in a statement.
It marks the first time that so-called Multilateral Maritime Cooperative Activities involving the countries have expanded beyond the South China Sea, where the Philippines and China have engaged in repeated clashes over disputed territory.
Little more than 100 km separates the Philippines and self-ruled Taiwan, which China views as its territory and has not ruled out taking by force.
“Air operations were conducted within airspace over Philippine territory and its territorial sea, north of Luzon,” the Philippine military said in a statement, adding naval vessels had stayed west of the Batanes island chain.
Armed forces public affairs chief Colonel Xerxes Trinidad said it was the “first time” MMCA operations had been conducted in the “said operational box.”
The military’s statement said that box extended “up to the northern tip of Luzon, particularly Mavulis Island,” which hosts small Philippine navy and marine detachments.
China’s military reacted angrily to the drills on Friday.
“The Philippines co-opted countries outside the region to organise the so-called joint patrols, disrupting peace and stability in the region,” said Zhai Shichen, spokesperson for the PLA’s Southern Theater Command.
He added that China had conducted a “routine patrol” of the South China Sea from Feb. 23 to 26.
In November, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi sent relations with Beijing into a tailspin by suggesting that Tokyo could intervene militarily in any attack on Taiwan.
Beijing imposed export restrictions and warned its citizens against visiting Japan, while accusing Tokyo of attempting to “revive militarism.”
Japan’s defense minister upped the ante by saying on Tuesday that Tokyo planned to deploy surface-to-air missiles on one of its remote western islands located near Taiwan by early 2031.
In August, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos warned that the Philippines would be dragged “kicking and screaming” into any war over Taiwan.
“I hope it doesn’t happen ... But if it does, we have to plan for it already,” he said, citing the large numbers of Filipinos working in Taiwan.
The Philippine-US-Japanese exercise took place over six days and concluded on Thursday. It included a live-fire gunnery exercise conducted by the guided missile frigate BRP Antonio Luna.
