The trial during which five suspects, including three Belgian men, will be tried is set to take place in Dendermonde correctional court on Friday. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Suspects in what Child Focus has called Belgium’s “largest child pornography case ever” will face trial at the Dedermonde correctional court on Friday.

The five suspects, three Belgians, a Dutchman and an Englishmen, collected and distributed child pornography for a total of 13 years- from 2004 to 2017. The suspects were in possession of around 9 million pornographic photos and videos, which were uncovered by detectives during an investigation into the pornography network.

“I have been in this sector for almost 25 years and thought I had seen everything. But never everything in one file, like now,” CEO of Child Focus, Heidi De Pauw, told HLN.

The men, all of whom confessed to the crimes after being arrested, also took pornographic photographs of their own children, stepchildren, and their friends’ children at swimming pools, zoos and Christmas markets.

According to the charges, the men ordered child pornography both from each other as well as from foreign contacts.

For Child Focus, the acting civil party in the case representing the thousands of unidentified victims in the network, the case is one of the largest files of child pornography in the 22-year-long history of the organisation.

Evie McCullough

The Brussels Times