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  Missions of Mercy Tainted

Calgary Herald
April 1, 2010

http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Missions+mercy+tainted/2354661/story.html

Anne Jarvis

They are among the world's poorest people, and he was their saviour.

Their children's bellies distended from malnutrition, living in shacks, they turned to John Duarte, a former Windsor priest and founder of the respected charity Hearts Together for Haiti. He was, as Windsor Star reporter Don Lajoie chronicled in his groundbreaking series Fallen Angels, their priest, doctor, teacher, cop, undertaker and counsellor.

Until, it's alleged, he began using his charity's money to get sex from kids.

More shocking than the allegations against Duarte is the revelation that children in developing countries around the world are exploited and abused by the missionaries, aid workers and peacekeeping troops there to care for them and protect them. Saddest of all is that, desperate and powerless, many accept it.

They trade sex for food, money, soap, sometimes luxuries like running shoes, according to a report last year by Save the Children. They are raped, prostituted, sold as sex slaves, trafficked.

Some are as young as six.

Orphans and those separated from their parents are favourites. There is no one to protect them, no one to turn to. The poorest families are so desperate that sometimes they turn a blind eye.

A girl in Sudan went with a peacekeeper, became pregnant and then went missing.

People in Haiti, Sudan and Ivory Coast told of abuse by 23 humanitarian, peacekeeping and security groups who deliver food, shelter, medical care, education and training. From guards to drivers to senior managers, staff at every level did it. The worst, the people said, are peacekeepers, partly because they can. They're armed.

Not every aid worker or peacekeeper is a child predator. But few groups are immune to the problem. Save the Children has dealt with it. Its fieldwork and other reports suggest the problem is significant -- and largely unreported.

In fragile societies with inadequate laws and policing, the powerless are at the mercy of the powerful. People can act largely with impunity, and some do.

That's why Canada, which spends hundreds of millions of dollars on foreign aid, sends peacekeeping troops abroad and allows aid groups to operate in the developing world, should protect the people it purports to help.

It should start, as the Haitian government suggested, by performing police checks on missionaries, aid workers and soldiers bound for countries like Haiti.

As a Haitian official said, what would Canada think if foreign countries sent alleged child abusers to care for our kids? People who work with children here, from teachers to coaches, must undergo background checks. But Canadians can establish orphanages in Haiti with no certification.

A developed and rich country, it is our obligation to take care in what we export to poor and developing nations. We must act simply because we can, and they can't.

Canada should also prosecute cases like Duarte to the fullest extent of the law. These charges are no less reprehensible because the alleged crimes happened elsewhere. On the contrary, they are more despicable because they are a betrayal of some of the most desperate and vulnerable people in the world.

Only three Canadians have been convicted of sex crimes against children in other countries since 1997. In the U.S., there were 47 convictions between 2003 and 2008. In Australia, there were 19 convictions between 1995 and 2007. Some countries pursue these cases more vigorously than others, it seems.

Weeks before Duarte was arrested, American Douglas Perlitz was charged with similar offences at a charity he founded in Haiti.

Senior federal law enforcement officials announced the arrest at a highly publicized news conference, underscoring the gravity of the allegations and the government's renewed efforts to track down and prosecute Americans who exploit children in foreign countries.

"Children deserve to be safe, whether they live in the United States or ... elsewhere," Connecticut's acting U.S. attorney told reporters.

There is much at stake -- the efforts of legitimate humanitarians who devote their lives to working in often wretched and dangerous conditions, the money and trust of the donors who support them and believe in them, the hundreds of millions in foreign aid from taxpayers and, most of all, the people in the developing world who count on us.

Meanwhile, Hearts Together for Haiti, rent by the scandal, much smaller and without its charismatic founder, starts anew. "No matter what has happened, the kids still need a school, people still need food and water," board member Keith Spratt told Lajoie. How much the charity can help depends on how much money it can raise.

Give generously.

Contact: ajarvis@thestar.canwest.com

 
 

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