Dear Friends,

Thank you for your donations and many kindnesses over the last 12 months. It’s been a challenging year for Child Rescue New Zealand.

Many of you will know that we’ve postponed our ‘Set the Captives Free’ dinner scheduled for Friday 27 March. We are profoundly disappointed after so much work and because so many of you had wanted to be there.

The good news is that our Philippines rescue leaders are coming to the re-launched event in November where we can celebrate over 5000 lives set free.

Our most recent rescue was under a week ago as Destiny Rescue continues operations in Cambodia, Dominican Republic, Thailand, Nepal, The Philippines and undisclosed nation.

Destiny Rescue has worked with police to arrest and prosecute pimps in recent cyber sex cases assistance by funds from NZ donors. Sadly NZ paedophiles are amongst the clients.

Our teams across every country including NZ are working online under similar restrictions.

Arrangements have been made for safe care and ongoing follow up of approximately 250 children in our programmes. Based on our experience, few if any, will return to the sex trade.

But for other children still in the industry we may be their last lifeline. Government closures of adult entertainment venues – for now – simply means that sex trafficking is now less obvious, it hasn’t stopped.

We are also deeply concerned about harsh new environmental and economic factors that are beginning to impact on the industry along with the Covid-19 spread.

Closure of Vietnam’s borders has stopped supplies of fresh vegetables into Cambodia, where the garment industry has stalled amid strong rumours of sharp food price increases.

We expect increases in online pimping, street pimping, begging and trafficking across borders closed to vehicles but open to people on foot.

Tourist (but not local) demand for sex has declined, so with the expected increase in supply, competition will increase, and the price will likely fall. This means incomes for the already desperate will be even lower.

We also expect that more girls will offer themselves to clients via social media and be pimped online increasing the danger from appointments outside the already meagre protection from brothels.

In many cities, testing and treatment for Covid -19, even if available, is beyond the financial reach of many exploited children, so it is important that we rescue them sooner not later.

We are shifting emphasis where possible, to more surveillance of social media, chat rooms and BNB type accommodation used for sex trafficking, more effective border monitoring and attention to street pimping.

Right now we need to ask you for some extra help.

Please would you pray for this ministry, particularly our girls. Across Thailand and Cambodia alone we have around 250 in either residential or community care at one time.

(If you’ve ever questioned whether Child Rescue and Destiny Rescue are Christian organisations, we are !)

Please would you also share our social media posts as much as possible.

Please check our Facebook page recently you’ll find it very informative and much faster moving than before.

Finally, please would you also prayerfully consider helping us financially.

We are extremely grateful to all donors who support our work, and recognise that these are difficult times for us all, but postponement of our dinner has left us around $ 40,000 behind where we hoped to be at year end.

If you’ve followed us and wondered whether or not to donate, would you consider making your first gift this month, please?

If you’ve been an occasional supporter, thank you. Would you consider a regular automatic payment to rescue a different child every year?

This costs $125 per month or just over $ 4.00 per day.

Go to www.childrescue.org.nz for more information including payment pathways.

For Freedom,

The Child Rescue Team