Forced Prostitution - Child Prostitution

Child Prostitution

Child prostitution is considered inherently nonconsensual and exploitative, as children, because of their age, are not legally able to consent to sex.

The Second Optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child is an optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and requires states to prohibit the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.

The Convention defines a child as any human being under the age of 18, unless an earlier age of majority is recognized by a country's law.

The Protocol was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000 and entered into force on 18 January 2002. As of May 2009, 131 states are party to the protocol and another 31 states have signed but not yet ratified it.

The Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (Convention No 182) of the International Labour Organization (ILO) provides that the use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution is one of the worst forms of child labor. This convention, adopted in 1999, provides that countries that had ratified it must eliminate the practice urgently. It enjoys the fastest pace of ratifications in the ILO's history since 1919.

In the United States, the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 classifies any "commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age" to be a Severe Form of Trafficking in Persons.

In many countries, especially poorer countries, child prostitution remains a very serious problem, and numerous tourists from the Western World travel to these countries to engage in child sex tourism. Thailand, Cambodia, India, Brazil and Mexico have been identified as leading hotspots of child sexual exploitation.