THE DIVIDE between First and Third Worlds has shown up in all its enduring intensity at the World Congress Against the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Stockholm. Indeed the very use of the word "commercial" is one of the points which has enraged a number of non governmental organisations (NGOs) at the conference.
A furious group of representatives of NGOs from the Indian subcontinent held a press conference yesterday to distance them selves from the congress's official declaration, which had been adopted, with some spoken reservations from Colombia and Cuba on Wednesday.
There have been similar rows at previous international congresses, most recently at the UN Women's Conference in Beijing. But what really sticks in the throats of the NGOs on this occasion is that two of the three main organisers of the Stockholm conference are of their ilk - the NGO for the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child and ECPAT (End Child Prostitution and Tourism).
The declaration adopted on Wednesday committed participants to "a global partnership against the commercial sexual exploitation of children, referring to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child".
"The plan of action is no action," said Mr C. Shiromal J. Fernando, of the Sri Lankan NGO Praja Mithuro. "The NGOs did not have a voice in the (declaration) session and it is very demeaning to us."
Although there has been criticism of the lack of specific concrete action, there have also been calls for more emphasis on the dignity and rights of the child, as opposed to a recital of the details of the trade which exploits them. Ms Sheela Barse, of the Neergaurav Res and Dev Foundation in Bombay, was scathing of the emphases at the Stockholm congress, and what she sees as a tendency to up service to commendable ideals by numerous governments. "The government statements are throwing garlands at themselves," she said.
Ms Barse, who was instrumental in tracking down the child abuser Freddy Peat, says steps such as witness protection and follow through of child abuse victims were more important than general aspirations for the future. (Freddy Peat, a German English resident of Bombay, kept an "orphanage" in the 1970s and 1980s at which hundreds of young children were sexually abused, traded internationally and forced to pose for pornography. Children as young as three were involved.)