Panaji, June 9 (IANS) Child sex tourism exists in all tourism hotspots, irrespective of the state or country, Goa Tourism Minister Dilip Parulekar said on Thursday. He said the coastal state had, however, "managed to control" it in Goa.
"This practice is prevalent in places wherever there is tourism. No country or state can deny this. But in Goa, which is also a tourism centre, the state government is controlling what we can," Parulekar told reporters after releasing an annual report of the Goa State Commission for Protection of Child Rights.
One of first tourism-related paedophilia rackets in the country was busted in Goa in the 1980s with the arrest of Freddy Peats, a German national. Peats' arrest helped bust a ring of international paedophiles who abused minor boys and girls at a shelter home run by Peats.
Goa is reckoned as one of the top beach tourism destinations in the country and attracts nearly four million tourists every year, half a million of them foreigners.
