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LAW 1336 OF 2009

​

(July 21)

​

by means of which Law 679 of 2001 is added and strengthened, to combat exploitation, pornography and sex tourism with

children and adolescents.

 

The Colombian Congress


DECREE:

Article 1. Self-regulation in tourist services and tourist accommodation services. Providers of tourist services and establishments that provide the non-tourist accommodation service must adopt, establish in a public place and update when required, effective codes of conduct, which promote prevention policies and prevent the sexual exploitation and exploitation of children, girls and adolescents in their activity, which will be designed in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 2 of this article.

A model of these codes will be developed with the participation of representative bodies of the sectors. For these purposes, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism with respect to the providers of tourism services and the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce with respect to non-tourist accommodation establishments, will convene the interested parties. Such codes will be adopted within the year following the effective date of this law, and will be updated according to new laws, new policies or new child protection standards adopted by international organizations, governmental or not.

The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism and the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce will adopt administrative measures to verify compliance with both the adoption and updating and constant compliance with the codes. For such purposes, it may request the recipients of this standard for the information considered necessary. The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism and the Superintendency of Industry and Commerce shall exercise the functions of verification of the obligations contemplated in this subsection and of sanction due to their omission, in accordance with the provisions of article 20 of the

Law 679 of 2001.

The district and municipal authorities will carry out periodic inspection and monitoring activities of the provisions of this article, in the event of finding a breach, they must forward the information to the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism and the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce, as the case may be. Article 2 °. Self-regulation of airlines. The airlines will adopt effective codes of conduct that promote prevention policies and avoid the sexual exploitation and exploitation of children and adolescents in their activity.

A model of these systems and codes will be developed with the participation of organizations representative of the sector. For these purposes, the Civil Aeronautics will convene the interested parties to formulate their proposals for codes of conduct in writing. Such codes will be adopted within the year following the effective date of this law, a copy of which will be sent to the office indicated by the Aeronautics and will be updated whenever it is deemed necessary in accordance with new laws, new policies or new standards. protection of children adopted within international organizations, governmental or not.

The Aeronautics will adopt, administrative measures tending to verify the fulfillment as much of the adoption as of the update and constant fulfillment of the codes. For the latter purpose, it may request the recipients of this rule for the information it deems necessary.

The breach of this rule by the authorities generates the disciplinary consequences of rigor. The breach of this rule by airlines generates the sanctioning administrative consequences applicable to the case of violation of the administrative instructions of the sector.

 

Article 3. Competence to demand information. Article 10 of Law 679 of 2001 will have a paragraph of the following wording:

"Paragraph: The Ministry of Communications shall be competent to demand, within the term it determines, all the information it deems necessary to Internet service providers, related to the application of Law 679 and others that add or modify it. Particular may:

1. Require internet service providers to inform in the time and manner indicated, what control mechanisms or filters are being used to block pornography sites with minors on the Internet.

2. Order internet service providers to incorporate mandatory clauses in internet portal contracts related to the prohibition and consequent blocking of pages with pornography content with minors.

The Internet service providers will grant access to their networks to the judicial and police authorities when the follow-up to an IP number from which violations of this law occur occurs.

The violation of these provisions will entail the application of the administrative sanctions referred to in article 10 of Law 679 of 2001, with the criteria and formalities provided for therein.

Article 4 Self-regulation of Internet coffee. Any establishment open to the public that provides Internet or Internet cafe services must place in a visible place a regulation of appropriate public use of the network, whose violation generates the suspension of the service to the user or visitor.

This regulation, which will be updated when required, will include a system of self-regulation and effective codes of conduct that promote policies to prevent the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, and to protect minors from all forms of access , consultation, viewing or display of pornography.

A model of these systems and codes will be developed with the participation of organizations representative of the sector. For these purposes, the Ministry of Communications will summon the interested parties to formulate in writing their proposals for self-regulation and codes of conduct. Such codes will be adopted within the year following the effective date of this law, a copy of which will be sent to the office indicated by the Ministry of Communications, its own structure or by delegation to the municipalities and districts, and will be updated each time that the Ministry of Communications considers it necessary in terms of new laws, new policies or new standards of child protection adopted within international organizations, governmental or not.

The district and municipal authorities will carry out periodic inspection and surveillance activities of the provisions of this article and will sanction their non-compliance in accordance with the procedures contained in the National Police Code and the departmental and district police codes that apply.

Failure to comply with the duties referred to in this rule will result in the same sanctions applicable to the case of sale of liquor to minors.

 

Article 5: Adherence to codes of conduct on the part of providers of tourist services. The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, will require the providers of tourist services for the purposes of their registration in the National Tourism Registry their adherence to the code of conduct indicated in Article 1 of this law. Likewise, it will require providers of tourist services already registered so that, within the terms and conditions established for the first update of the Registry that is carried out after the codes of conduct referred to in article 1 have been prepared, they adhere to the same. In the same way, each time the codes of conduct are modified in accordance with the provisions of article 1, applying for their adhesion either in the registration of the new providers or in the next update of the National Registry of Tourism to the providers already registered. The non-adherence to the codes of conduct by the providers will prevent the Ministry from making the corresponding registration or update.

Article 6 Awareness strategies. The Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism will advance awareness and information strategies on the phenomenon of sex tourism with children and adolescents, and will request the assistance of not only tourist service providers, but also associated commercial sectors. to tourism. The ICBF will be integrated into the activities referred to in this article, in order to ensure the articulation of such strategies with the National Plan for the Eradication of Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents.

 Article 7 Promotion of strategies. The providers of tourism services, airlines and intermunicipal transport service companies will lend their assistance in order to contribute to the dissemination of prevention strategies for the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in activities related to tourism, using the programs to promote their tourism plans and means of communication at their disposal, when they are required for this purpose by the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism or the Colombian Family Welfare Institute.

 Article 8 Persuasive notice. Without exception, every establishment where you sell or rent written, photographic or audiovisual material must set in a visible place a notice of annual validity that will carry a preventive legend about the existence of prevention legislation and fight against the use of children and adolescents in pornography The ICBF will establish the characteristics of the notice, and determine the content of the legend. It will be the responsibility of the aforementioned establishments to prepare the notice according to the standardized conditions determined by the ICBF. The police authorities will close for a period of 7 days to any establishment that shelters this measure and that has not located the poster, until it complies with the location of the notice.

 

CHAPTER II

Extinction of domain and other control measures in cases of sexual exploitation of children and adolescents

Article 9. Rules on extinction of domain. Law 793 of December 27, 2002, which repeals Law 333 of 1996 and establishes the rules governing the termination of ownership, and rules that modify it, will apply to hotels, pensions, hostels, residences, aparthotels and to the other establishments that provide the lodging service, when such buildings have been used for the commission of activities of sexual use of children and adolescents.

The goods, yields and fruits generated by the properties that this regulation deals with, and whose termination of ownership has been decreed in accordance with the laws, shall be used to finance the Fund against Sexual Exploitation of Minors. The revenues generated by virtue of the provisional destination of such assets will be allocated in the same way.

Article 10. Procurator's Office in compliance with Law 679 of 2001. The Attorney General of the Nation, without prejudice to its constitutional autonomy, shall exercise preventive assistance before the authorities of all territorial levels in charge of the construction, adaptation and execution of protocols and national guidelines for the assistance to victims of commercial sexual exploitation of girls, boys and adolescents, according to their characteristics and level of violation of their rights.

Article 11. Control of results of the Office of the Prosecutor. In the exercise of external control of the results of the management of the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation by the Superior Council of the Judiciary will examine the actions taken in the Office of the Prosecutor, in the context of the new accusatory criminal system, related to judicial representation of minor victims within criminal proceedings related to victims of crimes against freedom, integrity and sexual training, and the criminal sanction of punishable acts associated with the sexual exploitation or exploitation of children and adolescents.

CHAPTER III

Information rules

Article 12. Report to passengers. Through Aeronautical Regulations or Conducting Administrative Resolutions, Aeronautics

Civil will adopt concrete and permanent provisions that ensure that all national and foreign airlines inform their passengers, that in Colombia there are legal provisions that prevent and punish sexual tourism with children and adolescents.

The breach of this duty by Airlines and airlines, will result in administrative sanctions resulting from non-compliance with aeronautical regulations.

The Ministry of Transportation will issue the administrative resolutions of the case, with the same purpose for the control and sanction for breach of this duty by the international and national passenger land transport companies.

 

Article 13. Rules on statistical information. Article 36 of Law 679 of 2001 will read as follows:

Article 36. Statistical research. In order to produce and disseminate statistical information on the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents, as well as to unify variables, DANE will explore and test technically viable statistical methodologies, process and consolidate information through a unique format that must be filled by government organizations and non-governmental organizations, and carry out at least every two years research that allows the collection of statistical information on:

 - Approximate magnitude of children and adolescents under 18 years of age exploited sexually and commercially.

 - Characterization of the population under 18 years of age in commercial sexual exploitation condition.

 - Places or areas with higher incidence.

 - Forms of remuneration.

 - Forms of sexual exploitation.

 - Risk factors that promote the sexual exploitation of children under 18 years of age.

 - Profiles of men and women who buy sex and who are in charge of the intermediation.

The ICBF may suggest to the DANE to collect statistical information on any other data related to the problem. The district and municipal governors and mayors, as well as the indigenous authorities, will lend their assistance to the DANE to carry out the investigations.

Any natural or legal person of any order or nature, domiciled or resident in the national territory, is obliged to provide data to DANE in the course of its investigation. The collected data may not be disclosed to the public or to official entities or agencies, or to public authorities, but only in numerical and / or qualitative summaries, which prevent the deduction of individual information that could be used for purposes of discrimination. .

The DANE will impose a penalty of between one (1) and fifty (50) minimum legal monthly salaries in force to any natural or legal person, or public entity that fails to comply with the provisions of this rule, or that hinders the completion of the investigation, prior the application of the procedure established in the Contentious Administrative Code, with observance of the due process and criteria of adequacy, proportionality and recidivism.

Article 14. Annual report by the ICBF. The ICBF will prepare an annual report that must be presented to the Congress of the Republic within the first five (5) days of the second term of each term, by the director of the Colombian Family Welfare Institute.

The report must contain, at least, the following aspects:

 

  1. Analysis and diagnosis of the situation of childhood and adolescence in the country.

    2. The results of the policies, objectives, programs and plans during the previous fiscal period.

    3. The evaluation of the functioning of each of the Regional Directorates in which productivity levels and performance indicators are included.

    4. The policies, objectives and plans that the ICBF will develop in the short, medium and long term to comply with the Code of Children and Adolescents and Law 679 of 2001 and its reforms.

    5. The investment plan and the operating budget for the current year, including that related to the Fund against Sexual Exploitation of Minors, which is dealt with in article 24 of Law 679 of 2001.

    6. The description of the fulfillment of goals, and identification of the overdue goals, of all the entities that have competences assigned in the Code of Childhood and Adolescence and in Law 679 and its reforms.

    7. The summary of the problems that the Programs of Prevention and Fight against the Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents affect in the conjuncture, and of the necessities that exist in the opinion of the ICBF regarding personnel, physical facilities and other resources for the correct performance of the functions dealt with in Law 679.

    Paragraph 1 °. In order to explain the content of the report, the Director of the ICBF will attend the First Committees of the Senate and House of Representatives in exclusive sessions convened for that purpose, without prejudice to the powers that, in any case, the Congress of the Republic retains. to cite and invite at any time the public servants of the State, to know about the State of the application of the Law of Childhood and Adolescence and Law 679 of 2001.

    Paragraph 2 °. A copy of this report will be sent to the Attorney General of the Nation for its competence in preventive matters and disciplinary sanctions.

    Article 15. Compilation of information in charge of the Ombudsman's Office, charged to resources of the National Press. The Ombudsman's Office will produce annually a compilation of the basic statistics, as well as the main diagnoses, investigations and analyzes that are produced at a national level in the non-governmental sphere on the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. The compilation will be published by the National Press of Colombia, charged to its budget. The compilation will be preceded by an introduction, in which the criteria that were used to prioritize and make the selection will be explained, and certain specific issues that must be examined by authorities and individuals related to the execution of Law 679 of 2001 will be indicated.

    The annual compilation will be distributed with the strategic criteria defined by the Ombudsman's Office, and will be available in printed and magnetic form. In any case, it will be accessible to the public on the internet.

 

The Ombudsman's Office will publish defensive reports on the subject matter of Law 679 of 2001 and other regulations that modify it.

Article 16. Duty to report information. At the request of the ICBF, any institution of national, territorial or local level committed to the development of the National Plan against the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children of Children and Adolescents, or of the corresponding plans at their level, shall report the progress, limitations and projections. of that which corresponds to him, with the frequency, in the terms and formal conditions indicated by the Institute.

Article 17. Sex crimes information system. In application of article 257-5 of the Constitution, the Information System on Sexual Offenses against Children referred to in article 15 of Law 679 of 2001 will be in charge of the Superior Council of the Judiciary, who will convene the Ministry of the Interior and Justice, the Administrative Department of Security, DAS, the Police, the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare, Legal Medicine and the Attorney General's Office for that purpose. The system will be financed from the budget of the Superior Council.

The Superior Council will regulate the information system in such a way that there is a unified approach to the data through manuals or uniform instructions for the provision of information. The Council will also establish responsibilities and precise administrative competences in relation to the operation and feeding of the system, including those of the authorities that fulfill the functions of the Judicial Police; and it will dispose about the disclosure of the corresponding reports to the entities in charge of defining the policies associated with Law 679 of 2001. Likewise, it will keep the system updated based on the information provided to it.

Article 18. New chapter in the Annual Report to the Congress of the Superior Council of the Judiciary. In its annual report to Congress, the Superior Council of the Judiciary will include a chapter on the actions carried out in the Judicial Branch, in all jurisdictions, related to the constitutional protection of children and adolescents victims of crimes against freedom, integrity and sexual training, and the punishment of behaviors associated with the sexual exploitation or exploitation of minors.

CHAPTER IV

Criteria for classification of international cooperation pages and actions

Article 19. Document of classification criteria of Internet pages. The document on the classification criteria for Internet pages containing child pornography content and recommendations to the government will be updated every two years, in order to review the doctrinal validity of its definitions, update the criteria on types and effects of child pornography, ensure the current status of technological action frameworks, as well as the renewal of recommendations for the prevention and adequacy and efficiency of technical and administrative measures aimed at preventing the access of children and adolescents to any form of pornographic information contained on the Internet or any other global information network.

The commission of experts will be convened every two (2) years under the same conditions and with the same powers set forth in articles 4 and 5 of Law 679 of 2001 and its amendments.

The commission document will be an auxiliary criterion in administrative and judicial investigations, and will serve as a basis for preventive public policies.

 

Article 20. Events of international cooperation. Within a period not exceeding five years, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in coordination with the ICBF, will hold the first international cooperation event referred to in article 13 of Law 679, in the form of a regional summit that includes the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, in order to diagnose and analyze the problem of sex tourism with children and adolescents in the region, and to propose concrete recommendations of national, regional or global order for the fight against the scourge. The realization of these events will be successive.

CHAPTER V

Financing rules

Article 21. Fund against Sexual Exploitation. Subrogate paragraph 3 of article 24 of Law 679 of 2001, and instead provides:

Paragraph 3 °. It corresponds to the ICBF to prepare annually the draft budget of the Fund referred to in this article, which must be sent to the National Government, who must incorporate it into the annual budget bill. This responsibility will be assumed jointly with the Ministry of Social Protection and the support of the Interinstitutional Commission integrated by the official agencies responsible for the application of Law 679.

Each year, simultaneously with the awarding of the presentation of the Annual Budget Bill, the Board of Directors of the respective constitutional commission or commissions shall officiate to the ICBF to pronounce in writing about what was initially proposed to the Government and finally incorporated into the project. of annual law. The report will be delivered formally to the speakers for study and consideration.

The Secretaries of the respective Constitutional Commissions will have the responsibility to make the warnings on the subject.

Article 22. Tax jurisdiction. The competition for the regulation and collection of the tax on videos for adults referred to in article 22 of Law 679 of 2001 will be in charge of the National Tax and Customs Directorate.

The collection of the tax enshrined in article 23 of Law 679 of 2001 will be the responsibility of the Directorate of National Taxes and Customs in competition with the Civil Aeronautics.

The regulation of these taxes will be made within the six months following the validity of this law, without the Government affecting its regulatory power.

 

CHAPTER VI

Criminal types of sex tourism and storage and exchange of child pornography

Article 23. Sex tourism. Article 219 of Law 599 of 2000 recovers its validity, and will remain as follows:

Sex tourism Who directs, organizes or promotes tourist activities that include the sexual use of minors will incur a prison term of four (4) to eight (8) years.

The penalty will be increased by half when the conduct is performed with less than twelve (12) years.

Article 24. Article 218 of Law 599 will remain as follows:

Article 218. Pornography with persons under 18 years of age. Whoever photographs, films, records, produces, discloses, offers, sells, purchases, possesses, carries, stores, transmits or exhibits, by any means, for personal use or exchange, real representations of sexual activity involving a person under 18 years of age of age, will incur in prison of 10 to 20 years and a fine of 150 to 1,500 minimum monthly legal salaries in force.

The same penalty will apply to those who feed child pornography Internet databases, with or without profit.

The penalty will be increased by a third to half when the person in charge is a member of the victim's family.

Article 25. Surveillance and Control. The National Police will also have the following constitutional and legal functions:

Station and substation commanders, according to their competence, may order the temporary closure of establishments open to the public in accordance with the procedures set forth in the National Police Code, when the owner or person responsible for their economic exploitation performs any of the following behaviors:

1. Rent, distribute, market, display, or publish texts, images, documents, or audiovisual files of pornographic content to children under 14 years old through the Internet, video rooms, electronic games or similar.

2. In the case of hotels, pensions, hostels, residences, aparthotels and other establishments that provide lodging services, in accordance with the procedures indicated in the National Police Code, they are used or have been used for the commission of sexual activities of / or with children and adolescents, without prejudice to the other sanctions ordered by law.

3. Computer trading companies that do not deliver instructions or basic rules of online safety for children and adolescents in language accessible to buyers.

Article 26. In application of numeral 4 of article 95 of the Constitution, and within the spaces reserved by law for institutional messages, the CNTV will reserve the weekly time defined by its Board of Directors, for the disclosure of cases of missing or abducted children. The CNTV will coordinate with the ICBF and the Attorney General of the Nation for this purpose.

Article 27. Of the National Interinstitutional Committee. To implement the public policy of prevention and eradication of CSEC, the National Inter-Institutional Committee is created as an integrating entity and consultant to the National Social Policy Council.

The Committee will be composed of the following members:

 

  • State entities:

    Ministry of Social Protection, who will preside over it.

    Ministry of the Interior and Justice.

    Ministry of Education.

    Ministry of communications.

    Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism.

    Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

    Colombian Institute of Family Welfare.

    Administrative Department of Security.

    National Police (Child and Adolescent Police, Tourism Police, Dijin).

    Office of the Attorney General of the Nation.

    National Department of Statistics.

    Presidential Program for the National Youth System "Colombia Joven".

    b) Permanent guests

    1. Office of the Attorney General of the Nation.

    2. Ombudsman's Office.

    3. NGOs that work on the subject.

    4. Representatives of the private company.

    5. Representative of the organizations of children and adolescents.

    6. Representatives of international cooperation agencies that promote and support the Plan.

    Article 28. Term and derogations. This law governs from the date of its publication and repeals the rules that are contrary.

    The President of the honorable Senate of the Republic,

    Hernán Francisco Andrade Serrano.

    The Secretary General of the honorable Senate of the Republic,

    Emilio Ramón Otero Dajud.

    The President of the honorable House of Representatives,

    Germán Varón Cotrino.

    The Secretary General of the honorable House of Representatives,

    Jesús Alfonso Rodríguez Camargo.

    REPUBLIC OF COLOMBIA - NATIONAL GOVERNMENT

    Publish and comply.

    Given in Bogotá, D.C., on July 21, 2009.

    ÁLVARO URIBE VÉLEZ

    The Minister of the Interior and Justice,

    Fabio Valencia Cossio.

    The Minister of Finance and Public Credit,

    Oscar Ivan Zuluaga Escobar.

    The Minister of Social Protection,

    Diego Palacio Betancourt.

    The Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism,

    Luis Guillermo Plata Páez.

    The Minister of Communications,

    María del Rosario Guerra de la Espriella.

    NOTE: Published in the Official Gazette 47,417 of July 21, 2009.

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