Japan criticized over child porn loopholes

TOKYO, Japan (AP) -- Japan should ban possession of child pornography and crack down on animated films, comic books and computer games that show children being sexually exploited, UNICEF said Tuesday.

The United Nations Children's Fund said Japan's 1999 child pornography law suffers from serious loopholes that hobble law enforcement and threaten children around the world.

"Forms of child pornography that are banned in other countries but not in Japan ... are still widely available on the Internet and on the street," UNICEF said in a statement.

Japan was widely criticized for the wide availability of child pornography until it passed a special law in 1999. That law was tightened in 2004, and lawmakers are working on new measures to firm it up further.

U.S. Ambassador Thomas Schieffer, who recently published an opinion piece in a Japanese newspaper calling for a tighter law, met with Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama to urge such a crackdown.

Critics say a major flaw with the current law is that while it bans production and distribution of child pornography, it is not a crime to possess it.

"Because it is legal in Japan to possess child pornography, it is almost impossible for investigators here to obtain search warrants to confiscate and search suspects' computers," Schieffer wrote in the Jan. 31 article in the Yomiuri newspaper.

The law does also not cover images of child pornography in animated films, comic books and computer game software -- products that Japan is a major producer of.

"(As) Japan, known worldwide as an IT and software contents giant, is left uncontrolled, hundreds of thousands of children ... continue to be sexually exploited," the UNICEF statement said. E-mail to a friend

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