Prostitution in Colombia
overview of the legality and practice of prostitution in Colombia
Prostitution in Colombia is legal, regulated and limited to brothels in designated "tolerance zones". Sex workers are required to have regular health checks. However, the laws are rarely applied and prostitution is widespread, partly due to poverty and internal displacement.
Domestically, organized crime networks, some related to illegal armed groups, are responsible for human trafficking for sexual slavery and the armed conflict has made a large number of internal trafficking victims vulnerable.
UNAIDS estimate there to be 7,218 prostitutes in the country.
Illegal prostitution
Child prostitution
A series of factors put children at risk for sexual exploitation in Colombia and leave them unprotected. The war and the drug trade have altered family structures that in ordinary times would have provided safety and nurture. The war has also caused the displacement of countless families, some of whose children have been soldiers in the war. Displaced children are particularly vulnerable to being forced into prostitution, even more so in the declining economy.
A spokesman for the UN's children's fund, UNICEF, Karel de Rooy, said many child prostitutes were as young as nine years old and that clients were often middle-aged foreigners.
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This entry incorporates text from “Prostitution in Colombia” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.