Brussels, 26/03/2009 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 25 March 2009, EU Justice Commissioner Jacques Barrot unveiled two new items of legislation to combat human trafficking, sexual abuse of children, the exploitation of children and child pornography (described in detail in issue 9868), describing the new legislation at a press conference as being of 'key importance' given the scale of the crimes in question. He said the EU's message was clear - these forms of criminality that do not stop at borders are unacceptable and the EU will continue to set the highest and most ambitious standards to combat them. He said that both proposals include tougher penalties than current legislation. On the legislation on human trafficking, Barrot said one of the main ideas behind the new rules was that the victims should not be punished for being forced to take part in illegal acts. He said the recommended new measures would also penalise begging and trafficking in transplant organs. It would only be possible to take legal action against the clients of trafficked prostitutes if the client was aware that the prostitute was a sex slave or if the client were connected with a criminal group responsible for trafficking. According to the International Labour Organisation, 1,225,000 people around the world are currently the victims of human trafficking, most of them being forced into prostitution (43%) or forced labour (32 %). When it comes to sexual abuse, the vast majority of victims (98%) are women and young girls. Around half a million people fall victim to human trafficking every year in the EU, either within the EU itself or being shipped into the EU, explained the Commissioner. On the draft legislation on the sexual abuse of children, Barrot a explained that a huge number of children (between 10% and 20% according to reliable estimates) are the victim of sexual violence during childhood. Estimates suggest that around 20% of convicted paedophiles go on to further acts of paedophilia in the future. The Commissioner explained that victims are often reluctant to come forward and only a quarter of cases get reported. He said that the internet was leading to a snowballing of cases of paedophilia. In 2008, more than 1,000 commercial websites and some 500 non-commercial websites were found selling or containing child pornography, 71% of them in the United States. Against this backdrop, the Commissioner pointed out that some €300,000 in EU funding would be used to develop an EU cybercrime platform managed by Europol. (B.C. trans fl)