Easy currency: Poverty and abuse in Cambodia’s ‘virginity trade’
Danet* is fourteen, and lives in a house built on wooden stilts, with no walls, and only tarpaulin for shelter. ... The ‘virginity trade’ is rampant in Cambodia, particularly in the capital, and is “a big problem”, says Tim Huon from Action Pour Les Enfants (APLE), a non-governmental organisation that investigates child sex abuse and exploitation here. Ordinarily, ‘virgin buying’ is popular among “rich, powerful Asian men who believe that if they have sex with a virgin it will bring them good health and good luck, and some think that it will even cure diseases, like HIV”, Mr Huon explains. ...
