Italian police have made six arrests in a massive nationwide sweep targeting people involved in the distribution of online child pornography and sex tourism with minors.
A high school teacher, a sociologist, a bank clerk, an office worker, a factory worker and a metalworker from different parts of the country were arrested in the sweep coordinated by police in Siracusa under the code name Operation Thai.
Investigators searching the house of the teacher in Campania found over 70,000 carefully indexed photos and DVDs showing children engaged in sexual acts, some of which they described as ''particularly sordid''.
Police also stopped a 55-year-old Italian university professor as he got off a plane from Bangkok at Rome's Fiumicino airport.
The professor was in possession of child pornography videos filmed in Thailand in which he appeared as a protagonist.
Italian and Thai police are collaborating to identify the children in the videos, since under Italian law paedophilia-related charges can still be brought even if the crime was committed outside the country.
Operation Thai began following tip-offs from child-abuse hotline Telefono Arcobaleno, which runs a web monitoring service for tracking down paedophile porn.
''Paedophilia is a business, and the criminal circuit is fed by the terrible economic mechanism of supply and demand for new material,'' said Telefono Arcobaleno president Giovanni Arena.
''It's not surprising that there is a connection between child pornography and sex tourism.'' More than 100 people involved in the dissemination of child pornography are now under investigation across Italy as part of the operation, from Trentino in the north down through Tuscany and Lazio to Campania, Puglia and Sicily in the south. Police said those under investigation were from all walks of life and included soldiers and local businessmen.
