The Swedish government announced Wednesday that it has called Amazon and several e-commerce platforms to a meeting over the sale of child-like sex dolls on their websites.
Swedish children’s rights organization ChildX on Monday filed a police complaint against Amazon (including all domestic affiliates) and two other portals selling dolls in Sweden, alleging that these sales may violate child sexual exploitation laws.
There is growing international controversy surrounding these products. Chinese platform Shein recently banned the sale of these dolls after France threatened to expel the company for allowing them to be sold. The Chinese e-commerce giant continues to operate in France under close government scrutiny even after suspending sales on the market.
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ChildX warned that selling these types of products on the global market risks normalizing child sexual abuse and increasing demand for exploitative material.
Sweden’s Social Welfare Minister Camilla Waltersson Grenvall convened a meeting on the 28th of this month with representatives of e-commerce platforms, child protection organizations and other authorities to discuss ways to contain the problem.
“We must jointly explore the possibility of eliminating the existence of these dolls,” the minister declared in a statement.
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Amazon acknowledged its participation in the meeting and said it had removed the products mentioned.
A company spokesperson said: “We have strict policies in the area of adult products and have always strictly prohibited child pornography.”
ChildX called on Amazon to take greater responsibility for the products sold on its platform.
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“By removing the ad, Amazon is acknowledging that it is problematic and seriously flawed,” the group’s general secretary Ida Ostenson said, adding: “The ad was already criticized in 2018, but the dolls were put on sale again three days later. We demand they take responsibility.”
Under Swedish law, distributing or possessing images of child sexual abuse is as illegal as possessing a child-like sex doll. For ChildX, selling these dolls should also be illegal, but no case of this kind has ever been heard in court.
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