WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 27, 201 4 | WWW.PGCITIZEN.CA World 19 Report details rampant child sex-abuse in British town AP PHOTO Professor Alexis Jay speaks during a press conference at the New York Stadium, Rotherham, England on Tuesday following the publication of a report she wrote which found around 1,400 children were sexually exploited in the town over a 16-year period. The Associated Press LONDON — About 1,400 children were sexually exploited in a northern England town, a report concluded Tuesday in a damning account of “collective failures” by authorities to prevent victims as young as 11 from being beaten, raped and trafficked over a 16-year period. Report author Alexis Jay cited appalling acts of violence between 1997 and 2013 in Rotherham, a town of some 250,000. The independent report came after a series of convictions of sexual predators in the region and ground-breaking reports in the Times of London. Reading descriptions of the abuse make it hard to imagine that nothing was done for so long. The report described rapes by multiple perpetrators, mainly from Britain’s Pakistani community, and how children were trafficked to other towns and cities in the north of England, abducted, beaten, and intimidated. “There were examples of children who had been doused in petrol and threatened with being set alight, threatened with guns, made to witness brutally violent rapes and threatened they would be next if they told anyone,” Jay said. “Girls as young as 11 were raped by large numbers of male perpetrators.” The report’s author took great pains to make sure the identities of the children were not revealed, but offered a general description of the cases showing the victims were between 11 and 16 years old. Most, but not all, were girls, who are preyed upon by unrelated older men. A sampling of case studies showed the victims first came into contact with authorities for a variety of reasons, including being reported missing from their homes, leaving school with unknown men or as victims of stalking. While most of the victims in the older cases were described as “white British children,” the report said that more recently a greater number of cases were coming from the growing Pakistani, Kashmiri and Roma communities. Attention first fell on Rotherham in 2010 when five men received lengthy jail terms after convictions of grooming teens for sex. A series of other high-profile cases featuring Pakistani rings also emerged in Rochdale, Derby and Oxford - and communities began to look more closely at their child sex exploitation cases. Rotherham decided to conduct a formal inquiry and Jay, a former chief social work adviser to the Scottish government, was appointed to investigate. But she told the BBC that she was “very shocked” by what she found. Police “regarded many child victims with contempt,” Jay said, adding that many of the children were known to child protection agencies. Even though earlier reports described the situation in Rotherham, the first of these reports was “effectively suppressed” because senior officers did not believe the data. “The collective failures of po- litical and officer leadership were blatant,” Jay said. “From the beginning, there was growing evidence that child sexual exploitation was a serious problem in Rotherham.” Complicating the reporting was the fact that victims described the perpetrators as “Asian” and yet the council failed to engage with the town’s Pakistani community. “Some councillors seemed to think it was a one-off problem, which they hoped would go away” Jay said. “Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpe- trators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.” Rotherham has had its problems even before Tuesday’s report. It has seen the loss of traditional industries from the 19th and 20th centuries and, though the local economy has grown recently, it is also marked by deprivation and high unemployment. The report said the take-up of “welfare benefits is higher than the English average, as are the levels of free school meals and limiting long- term illness.” But news of the sheer scale of the abuse and the lack of official concern about the problem until it was exposed shocked the country. Charities that deal with abused children were taken aback by the number of victims and by the apparent reluctance of authorities to accuse members of one ethnic group for the violence. This after all, is a country which prides itself as being a tolerant and integrated society. But the idea that a drive for political correctness might lead to children being raped sat uncomfortably with those who champion the rights of children and seek to protect them from harm. “Cultural sensitivities should never stand in the way of protecting children,” said John Cameron, head of the helpline for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. “It is hard to imagine the damage caused to victims who were preyed upon with almost impunity over many years, because of a reluctance to comprehend or address what was widely happening.” The local council leader, Roger Stone, resigned immediately. Prime Minister David Cameron’s Downing Street office said that the lessons of past failures must be learned and those who exploited the children brought to justice. “This damning report shows the full extent of how the children of Rotherham were let down,” said Keith Vaz, the chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee. “They will never get their childhoods back.” Israel, Hamas agree to open-ended ceasefire The Associated Press GAZA, Gaza Strip — Israel and Gaza’s ruling Hamas agreed Tuesday to an open-ended ceasefire after seven weeks of fighting - an uneasy deal that halts the deadliest war the sides have fought in years, with more than 2,200 killed, but puts off the most difficult issues. In the end, both sides settled for an ambiguous interim agreement in exchange for a period of calm. Hamas, though badly battered, remains in control of Gaza with part of its military arsenal intact. Israel and Egypt will continue to control access to blockaded Gaza, despite Hamas’ long-running demand that the border closures imposed in 2007 be lifted. Hamas declared victory, even though it had little to show for a war that killed 2,143 Palestinians, wounded more than 11,000 and left some 100,000 homeless. On the Israeli side, 64 soldiers and six civilians were killed, including two killed by Palestinian mortar fire shortly before the ceasefire was announced. Large crowds gathered in Gaza City after the truce took effect at dusk, some waving the green flags of Hamas, while celebratory gunfire and fireworks erupted across the territory. Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader, promised to rebuild homes destroyed in the war and said Hamas would rearm. “We will build and upgrade our arsenal to be ready for the coming battle, the battle of full liberation,” he declared, surrounded by Hamas gunmen. The Israeli response was more subdued. “This time we hope the ceasefire will stick,” said Israeli government spokesman Mark Re-gev. He portrayed the deal as one Hamas had rejected in previous rounds of negotiations. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faced some criticism from hard-line critics and residents of Israeli communities near Gaza who said the deal failed to defuse the threat from Gaza militants. Since July 8, Hamas and its allies have fired some 4,000 rockets and mortars at Israel, and tens of thousands of Israelis evacuated areas near Gaza in recent weeks. Ukrainian president claims to have backing for peace The Canadian Press MINSK, Belarus — Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said early Wednesday that he has support for a peace plan from leaders who attended a summit meeting in Minsk, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Interfax news agency reported. But there were no indications that would mean an immediate end to the fighting in eastern Ukraine between pro-Russia separatists and Ukrainian forces in which about 2,000 civilians and more than 700 Ukrainian troops have died. Putin said separately he had an “overall positive assessment” of Tuesday’s meetings, which included face-to-face talks with Poroshenko. Putin told reporters there was no discussion of a ceasefire in Ukraine because Russia is not a party to the conflict. Moscow is accused by Kyiv and the West of arming and supporting the rebels - a charge the Kremlin denies. THE geokge CITIZEN! deadline r the Friday Map *® aM ON THURSDAY SORRY, NO EXCEPTIONS! 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