Wellington - A 43-year-old New Zealand man who ran two Internet sites selling child pornography to customers in Europe and the United States was sent to prison for two years on Tuesday.
Glenn William Roberts, an unemployed carpenter, was said to have traded in more than 240 000 pictures and films of children aged between three and 14 - nearly 3 640 of them featuring sex acts or poses.
Arrested after a tip off from Interpol in London, Roberts was said to have run a network linking 700 users of child pornography around the world.
Keith Manch, of the department of internal affairs, said investigations were continuing in the United States and Europe, where more arrests were likely.
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'Sex with children is acceptable' Roberts was also fined $9 500 (about R85 120) and his computers and CDs ordered to be destroyed after he admitted 48 separate charges when he appeared in the Waitakere District Court, near Auckland.
In a statement after the hearing, Manch said, "The real tragedy of this case is that each picture and movie is of a child or children being abused or debased for the pleasure of an international market.
"His business was about making money from the sexual exploitation of children."
Manch said most children featured in the photos and videos were from overseas, but that endangered New Zealand children.
"It debases children by portraying them as sexual objects that can be used as desired by adults and reinforces the false view held by some that sex with children is acceptable."
He said the department's investigation found that Roberts was charging $29, 95 a month for access to a "members' gallery" on his websites, containing 97 049 pictures, 2 008 of which were objectionable.
He was also charging $50 for CDs found at his home to contain 34 274 objectionable pictures and 105 films of sex with children. - Sapa-DP
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