how to stop child rape and sexual abuse by aid workers - Andrew MacLeod (English)

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Former high-level official for the UN Andrew Macleod blew the whistle last year on a pedophilia network of massive proportions involving thousands of United Nations employees wreaking havoc on tens of thousands of innocent children. In this Potkaars interview Andrew explains what the response of the UN was to his reporting and how child rape and sexual abuse by aid organisations employees should be addressed.

In 2008 a report came out by ‘save the children’ called: ‘No One to Turn To - The under-reporting of child sexual exploitationand abuse by aid workers and peacekeepers’.
In it is said: ‘“My friends and I were walking by the National Palace one evening when we encountered a couple of humanitarian men. The men called us over and showed us their penises. They offered us 100 Haitian gourdes (US$2.80) and some chocolate if we would suck them. I said no, but some of the girls did it and got the money.” (source: pseataskforce)

Some eleven years after that report came out Andrew MacLeod said in a written interview yesterday: ‘“Save the Children have done little to prevent abuse by their own staff and contractors. So while their report was good to highlight the issue, one has to wonder if they too have gone silent on the issue because they have too much to hide themselves.” (source: insideover May 30th 2019 )

In Potkaars Andrew explains how he came about the numbers in his reporting and why both aid-organisations, the United Nations itself and its member states are unable and appear unwilling to stop child rape by aid workers. Why? Follow the money. We discuss how even whistleblowing has limited effect and what can be done to change this.

Andrew is co-founder and director of Hear Their Cries – an organisation established to stop the abuse of this nature from happening. On their website the United Nations Secretary General Guterres is quoted:

“First, sexual exploitation and abuse is not a problem of peacekeeping, it is a problem of the entire United Nations. Contrary to the information spreading that this is a question related to our peacekeeping operations, it is necessary to say that the majority of the cases of sexual exploitation and abuse are done by the civilian organizations of the United Nations, and not in peacekeeping operations.” (18 September 2017 Secretary-General’s address to High-Level Meeting on the United Nations Response to Sexual Exploitation and Abuse).

In 2016 Guterres recognised there were over 140 incidents of sexual abuse involving more than 300 victims in peace operations. We know therefore that most cases of United Nations Staff sexual abuse happen outside peace operations. Guterres knows that many of the victims are children and that the above numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. This must stop. (source: heartheircries.org)

This is not just a problem of the United Nations or its various aid organisations, MacLeod explains, it is the countries that make up the UN including the Netherlands that need to take ownership of the problem and a responsible approach. Instead Dutch minister Blok chose to award Jordan prins Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein with a Dutch human rights award -parliamentary questions notwithstanding, as Al Hussein was the one who fired whistleblower on this topic Anders Kompass-. Andrew then goes to explain how whistleblower protection in the United Nations, the EU and in its member countries should be improved and why it is a focus of hear their cries.

What minister Blok and his colleagues in the other United Nations should do is make these rape crimes performed by aid workers abroad, punishable by domestic law.

Andrew MacLeod is author of ‘A Life Half Lived - Surviving the World's Emergency Zones’ (2013) and of the books ‘Prospection, Well-being, and Mental Health’. and ‘All Together Healthy,  health / mental health’.


We end the interview on the positive note of well-being and mental health, as Andrew is about to set sail to the Arctic to see Polar bears in the wild.

In the interview Andrew MacLeod suggests you do your own fact checking, for example by looking up these words in your search engine of choice:


links to some of the documents mentioned in the interview:

activisme, politiek, klokkenluidersRico Brouwerpotkaars, english, andrew macleod, rico brouwer, child rape, sexual abuse, united nations, hear their cries, verenigde naties