Pave: Coupable mais non responsable : Didier Bourguet

Le jour 484 de Sarko

I admit the sexual relations and the pornography, but I deny rape.

Didier Bourguet,
UN something-or-other, clueless pædophile,
confessed pornographer, and alleged rapist,
arguing a $10 payment for sex
with underaged girls excuses rape
(infra)

You may remember M. Bourguet, who, aside from being a pædophile on the cheap and a pornographic self-documentarian, is an exemplary French citizen, or so his lawyer Claude de Boosère Lepidi would have us believe:

This is unusual, astonishing you may think, but Mr Bourguet has been co-operating fully with this investigation. Nobody has been chasing him for information. [He is jailed.] It was he who voluntarily revealed his part in this affair. [Having been apprehended in flagrante and deported.] In France we do things differently to these other countries.* The government here has expressed its intention to come down hard on these sorts of acts.

M. Bourguet -- variously described as a mechnic, a senior UN logistics officer, and head of a Congolese sex ring -- was caught in flagrante with an underage Congolese girl. Here is the Times account of his arrest:

When police raided his home they discovered that he had turned his bedroom into a studio for videotaping and photographing sex sessions with young girls.

The bed was surrounded by large mirrors on three sides, according to a senior Congolese police officer. On the fourth side was a camera that he could operate from the bed with a remote control.

When the police arrived the man was allegedly about to rape a 12-year-old girl sent to him in a sting operation. Three home-made porn videos and more than 50 photographs were found.

The Times wryly notes:

The prospect of the pornographic videos and photographs — now on sale in Congo — becoming public worries senior UN officials, who fear a UN version of the scandal at the American-run Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. A senior official:

It would be a pretty big problem for the UN if these pictures come out.

Of course, no problem if they don't, if their circulation remains "hidden".

AN ASIDE: For "dark America" critics in the French peace mob (and here), we point out the obvious differences:

Abu Ghraib was investigated, exposed, and prosecuted with convictions by American authorities; the Secretary of Defense accepted responsibility for the abuse on his watch and twice offered his resignation; and the President of the United States personally apologized for the abuses on Arab television.

The UN, aware of the damning evidence in circulation, frets about damage control and hunkers down. (See footnote for the UN's "What can we do?" defense.)

M. Bourguet concedes he "videotaped some of the sexual encounters but insisted that the images were solely for his own gratification and were not intended to be circulated." Here is ABC 20/20:

Congolese officials say scores of young girls in the Congo were somehow lured into sex with a senior UN logistics officer named Didier Bourguet, a French citizen who photographed his victims having sex with him. Some appear to be even younger than 11, based on what "20/20" saw in the hard drive in his computer. In one photo a tear rolls down the cheek of a victim. Congolese officials suspect Bourguet was sharing these computer images with others in the UN. But he was sent back to France to face prosecution before a full investigation could be completed.

M. Bourguet was deported to France and arrested upon arrival, where, according to M. Lepidi, he burst into "a spontaneous confession". M. Bourguet is accused of and has confessed to intercourse with Congolese girls, aged between 12 and 16, along with related offenses, contested and uncontested.

And now M. Bourguet will have his day in court.

FRENCH UN WORKER ACCUSED OF RAPE IN AFRICA MISSIONS

PARIS September 9, 2008 (Reuters) - A former U.N. employee [M. Bourguet] went on trial in France on Tuesday accused of raping around 20 underaged girls ["22 fillettes"] during missions to Africa between 1998 and 2004.

... At the beginning of the hearing in Paris, at which one of his alleged victims was present, Bourguet acknowledged that he had had sex with the girls but he said they had consented.

... His lawyer told reporters that Bourguet, who worked in the Central African Republic between 1998-2001 and the Democratic Republic of Congo between 2001-04, would argue that he had no way of knowing the girls were underaged (« là-bas, elles étaient tellement précoces que c’est difficile de savoir »).

No clue he was snuggling a twelve-year-old? [Pause.] We note that M. Bourguet is not blind.

------------------------------------
* Child sex abuse and sex trafficking follows the UN everywhere it goes: Bosnia, Burundi, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Haiti and Liberia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, et al. The UN depends on member states for "peacekeepers". Although the responsible authority for UN missions, the UN does no background checks on "peacekeepers" who enjoy exemption from prosecution in the host nation.

In the Congo investigation, 19 "peacekeepers" from Uruguay, Pakistan, Nepal, Morocco, Tunisia and South Africa were implicated with M. Bourguet. These troops were sent back to their originating countries. None faces criminal proceedings. (Libération reports the UN recently revealed an additional 100 Indian Casques bleus implicated in pædophilic abuse in the Congo.)

Here is a UN officer formerly stationed in the Congo:

We can't force the countries that contribute peacekeepers to international missions to prosecute them for criminal activities. And if they don't, as they haven't so far in this case, these guys get off scot free. The crux of the problem is that if the UN gets bolshie [scil., tough] with these governments then they stop providing the UN with troops and staff. We'd like to come down hard on them, but we're caught. What do we do?

[Pause. We re-read the above. Pause. We re-re-read the above.]

"What do we do?" [Pause.] What do you do?

Get BOLSHIE, you stupid comfy-on-my-ass-hand-wringing bureaucratic wanker!

PFFT (What is this?): Coupable mais non responsable 0 | On vous laisse juge 4½ | Rayonnement français 1½

Posted by Damian at September 10, 2008 02:45 PM