Ireland performs poorly in combating child sex trafficking, says report
Ireland is among the poorest performing EU states when it comes to combating child sex trafficking.
An international report, launched today by the Children's Rights Alliance, shows that 53% of European countries are showing some progress in dealing with this issue.
Ireland is near at the bottom of the list with only Luxembourg, Poland and Portugal worse off.
Around 1.2 million children are trafficked globally on an annual basis.
Here, the HSE says 27 children have gone missing between January and May of 2009, of whom only two have been accounted for.
It is feared that many of these vulnerable, missing children have been trafficked.
