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Dutch parliament to debate extradition in Brazilian child porn case

Other News Materials 14 April 2008 10:53 (UTC +04:00)

(dpa) - The Dutch Labour party wants an emergency debate in parliament to debate whether or not two Dutch nationals can be extradited to Brazil to serve a prison sentence of, respectively, 21 and 17 years.

In 2003, the two men had already been convicted in Brazil for producing child porn and for having sexually abused 24 girls. The local court sentenced them to eleven and eight years imprisonment respectively.

But the Netherlands and Brazil do not share an extradition agreement. The Dutch nationals' application to the Dutch consulate in Rio de Janeiro for an emergency passport was granted that year, enabling the men to travel from Brazil to the Netherlands and avoid serving their jail terms.

The Dutch decision to grant the men passports caused outrage in Brazil, but subsequent requests by the Brazilian authorities to the Netherlands for the men's extradition did not bear any result.

Khadija Arib, legislator for the Labour party - the second largest party in the government coalition - wants Justice minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin (Christian Democrats) to investigate whether the two men can be extradited to Brazil based on an appendix to the international convention for the rights of the child.

Attorney Frans Nederstigt of the international child rights' organisation Terre des Hommes in the Netherlands claims there are legal possibilities for such an extradition based on the convention for the rights of the child.

Legislator Arib's initiative comes one week after the two men were sentenced to longer prison terms by the appellate court in Brazil.

The two Dutch men also stood trial in the Netherlands. One of them was sentenced to 240 hours of work duty; the second, his brother-in-law, was acquitted. Appeals to both cases are still ongoing.

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