We’re going after sex offenders, says Palace

The Interagency Commission Against Trafficking—composed of scores of government and law enforcement agencies—has been tasked to rid the country of a pedophile ring victimizing minors, Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma said on Thursday.

“I would like to emphasize that our government is determined to stop human trafficking in all its forms and manifestations through concerted action by all concerned government agencies in cooperation with other countries,” Coloma said in a press briefing.

“Let me point out that even before the publication of this report, the government has already committed itself to doing everything that needs to be done through interagency effort, through legislation and through other administrative measures to stop this trafficking,” he said.

“This is a matter of high priority for our government that is not prompted by recent media reports,” he said, stressing that the government had launched a “widespread campaign against trafficking, a general category that includes sex abuses.

“That is why we have already enacted a Cybercrime Prevention Law,” Coloma said. However, he lamented that the law has been questioned in the Supreme Court and the case remains pending.

Interior Secretary Mar Roxas said the Philippine National Police would support the efforts of the United States, Australia and Britain against the pedophile rings. “It’s really deplorable,” he told reporters in a chance interview.

Chief Supt. Reuben Theodore Sindac said PNP special units had been cooperating with their foreign counterparts to dismantle crime groups involved in child pornography.

“It’s a new frontier in the field of law enforcement,” the PNP spokesman told reporters. “We really need international cooperation in battling this crime because it transcends territorial barriers and political boundaries.”

Director Virgilio Mendez of the National Bureau of Investigation said his agency had been looking into cyberporn activities, particularly in the Visayas and Mindanao. “We have agents in the provinces looking into it right now,” he said.

Arrest

The NBI last year arrested 27-year-old Aldren Aumento after UK authorities passed on an intelligence report on the money he received from an arrested pedophile.

Aumento, a computer science graduate, told the Inquirer that he had been operating a child pornography website since 2009. He said he used children aged between 3 and 12 years old and paid them P300 to P350 per show. His said his overseas clients paid him $250.—Reports from Michael Lim Ubac, Marlon Ramos and Nancy C. Carvajal

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