For beauty; against abuse

The Body Shop has donated €1,000 to Aġenzija Appoġġ, raised through the sale of a special edition hand cream, 'Soft Hands, Kind Heart'.

Body Shop International European region account director Paula Bedford presented the cheque to Foundation for Social Welfare Services CEO Sina Bugeja, and The Body Shop Malta director Simone Mizzi, in the presence of Commissioner for Children Helen D'Amato.

Last October, The Body Shop Malta joined a worldwide campaign launched by The Body Shop International to further global awareness about the growing exploitation of children and young adolescents for sexual purposes.

The campaign was launched at the same time by The Body Shop International with End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and the Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT), an international organisation working in this field but not present in Malta.

Aġenzija Appoġġ is using the funds donated to produce educational material on the issue. Some 400,000 units of this hand cream have been sold over the Body Shop network across 64 countries, with ECPAT and other local institutions working in the field of child protection benefitting from the campaign.

Meanwhile, The Body Shop Malta has launched the second phase of its campaign, and is asking the public to sign a petition running simultaneously in all Body Shop stores worldwide.

The aim of this petition in Malta is to urge the government to prioritise the signing of the Council of Europe convention on the protection of children against sexual abuse and bring Malta in line with other European nations.

It is also requesting the for-mation of a sex offenders reg-ister, which is not yet available in Malta. The petitions are available in all Body Shop outlets in Malta.

The aim of the international campaign by The Body Shop is to raise 3,000,000 signatures worldwide in one voice against human trafficking.

For more information about this campaign, visit www.thebodyshop.com/stop. For more information about Aġenzija Appoġġ and human trafficking, visit www.appogg.gov.mt.