An international police operation into child pornography led to the
arrest of 245 people and the rescues of 123 children, mostly in the US, the US
immigration enforcement agency announced Thursday. John Morton, director of the
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, said 23 of the suspects were
arrested in six more countries, though declined to specify them. "I can't,
for very sensitive operational reasons, identify the countries involved,"
he said.
Thirteen of the children were rescued outside the United States during
Operation Sunflower -- a five-week operation from November 1 to December 7
aimed at identifying people who own, trade or produce child pornography. Among
the children, 45 were under 12 years old, including five less than three years
old. There were 70 girls and 53 boys, Morton noted, adding that 23 of the
children have since reached the age of majority. Operation Sunflower was named
in honor of the one-year anniversary of an investigation that started when
Danish police found Internet postings by a sixteen-year-old boy about his plans
to rape an 11-year-old girl.
Thanks to a photo posted online showing a highway sign with a sunflower,
investigators were able to find the house of the boy in Kansas and rescue the
girl. ICE works in partnership with the National Center for Missing and
Exploited Children, which is now asking the public to help identify two adult
suspects, shown molesting a young girl in a photograph taken 11 years ago. In
2012, a record 1,655 people suspected of sexually abusing children were
arrested by the immigration enforcement agency, and 292 victims were identified
and rescued.
Source: Yahoo news
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