Maud de Boer-Buquicchio

De Boer-Buquicchio with the Board of Directors of the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children

De Boer-Buquicchio is a member of the Board of Directors of the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), a global nonprofit organization that combats child sexual exploitation, child pornography, and child abduction.[3]

She was elected President of Missing Children Europe in 2013, a position she took over from former Advocate General at the European Court of Justice, Sir Francis Jacobs.

De Boer-Buquicchio is married and has three sons.[2]

On 8 May, 2014, De Boer-Buquicchio was appointed Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.[4] From 12 to 18 May the following year she visited Armenia to investigate violence against children.[5].

From 19 to 26 October 2015, De Boer-Buquicchio traveled around Japan (Tōkyō, Ōsaka, Kawanishi and Naha) for eight days to investigate child trade, sexual exploitation, production of child pornography etc.,[6] and she held a press conference at Japan National Press Club in Tokyo on 26 October[Notes 1] to report the results.[Notes 2]

Tarō Yamada, then a member of the Japanese House of Councillors,[10] claimed that De Boer-Buquicchio's statements contained many prejudices, mistakes and misunderstandings:[11]

1. Around thirty [or thirteen] percent of Japanese school girls engage in enjo kōsai (compensated dating).

In local surveys, 4-5% of responding female high school students said they had engaged in enjo kōsai.[12]

2. The Japanese courts seldom find people violating child pornography laws guilty.

From 2013 to 2015, 526 people indicted for violation of child pornography law were found guilty and only one acquitted.[13]

3. The Japanese Child pornography laws (Act on Regulation and Punishment of Acts Relating to Child Prostitution and Child Pornography, and the Protection of Children etc.) stipulates light punishments for criminals. Even though they were judged to be guilty the criminals were only punished with a fine in most cases.

According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (MOFA), Japanese child pornography laws are not different from those in European countries or USA etc. from the point of view of gravity of punishments.[13] Also, Japanese court statistics indicate that about 95 percent of those found to have broken child pornography laws were sentenced to penal servitude.[13]

4. Japanese police hesitate to investigate cases when the victims do not file police reports.

Yamada inquired whether her allegation was true for the National Police Agency, which completely denied it officially.[14]

5. In Okinawa prefecture, if girls have to run away from home because of family breakdown they have no way to earn money but prostitution.

No evidence was presented to support this claim.[14]

De Boer-Buquicchio said that she had been misheard by the translator; she had said "thirteen percent" and the translator had heard "thirty percent".[15] On 2 November 2015, MOFA issued a complaint to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) over De Boer-Buquicchio's comment of 26 October, and asked her to disclose objective data for the claim of thirteen percent.[16] MOFA asked OHCHR to disclose the data from which De Boer-Buquicchio alleged 13%.[17][18]on 7 November 2015.

On 11 November 2015 MOFA received a letter from De Boer-Buquicchios, in which she admitted that there were no objective data supporting the 13% figure, and effectively withdrew her comments.[19][17][12]

In a report to the UN General Assembly released in September 2019, De Boer-Buquicchio urged states to ratify surrogacy agreements contracted abroad, claiming that "a strict interpretation of the notion of the sale or trafficking of children as a criminal offence can have dire consequences". She also urged that homosexual couples should be allowed to use surrogacy in order to become parents.[20]