Japan urged to tighten child porn laws

An international anti-child pornography congress in Brazil has urged Japan to outlaw the possession of such materials, observers say.

Participants in the third World Congress Against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents, held last week in Rio de Janeiro, called on Japanese lawmakers to join many other countries in banning the possession of child pornography, saying the country's laws lag behind the rest of the world, The Yomiuri Shimbun reported.

Simple possession of child pornography in Japan is not illegal, although its production and distribution is. Representatives of 140 national governments and non-governmental organizations attended the four-day congress. They called for a universal outlawing of child porn possession in an era when the Internet is enabling its distribution to become much easier, the newspaper said.

A non-binding declaration issued by the congress also called for the regulation of Internet providers and mobile phone companies who allow online distribution of child pornography, which would enable police to remove sites containing illegal images.