Inappropriate sexual relationships between older pro-migrant activists and young migrants continue to plague NGOs with a recent case in Switzerland adding to the list of incidents.
The recent trial of a Swiss man in his 60s in Lausanne saw a migrant claim that he had been engaged in a sexual relationship with the older pro-migrant activist when he was a teen in 2008, newspaper 20 Minutes reports.
The older man was said to have worked with Amnesty International at the time of the sexual relationship, which he later admitted to saying they had engaged in sexual touching.
When recently confronted by 20 Minutes, a spokesman said the organisation was not aware of the case and said the man is no longer employed by Amnesty International but insisted the group had rules that prohibited such sexual relations.
The case is just one in a long line of others involving pro-migrant activists sexually engaging with migrants, some of whom have been underage.
Only a year after the height of the migrant crisis in 2015, it was revealed that activists in the former Calais Jungle migrant camp in France had engaged in a form of sex tourism, exploiting young migrants living in the makeshift camp.
“I have heard of boys, believed to be under the age of consent, having sex with volunteers. I have heard stories of men using the prostitutes in the Jungle too,” one volunteer wrote on social media.
“I have heard of volunteers having sex with multiple partners in one day, only to carry on in the same vein the following day. And I know also, that I’m only hearing a small part of a wider scale of abuse,” they added.
Sex abuse of migrants has also allegedly occurred in Greece where the U.S.-based charity Mercy Corps, which has received donations from left-wing billionaire George Soros, was under investigation by Greek authorities in 2017.
NGOs working overseas have also seen several scandals relating to the sexual abuse of children including the founder of the Italian NGO Mama Africa who was the subject of an investigation earlier this year and the charity Oxfam which had its UK funding cut last year following the “sex for aid” scandal.