PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The Haitian girl known Victim No. 1 was 12 when she first had sex with a Sri Lankan peacekeeper. She says she didn’t even have breasts yet.

The boy, known as Victim No. 9, was 15 when his ordeal began. Over the course of three years, he said he had sex with more than 100 Sri Lankan peacekeepers, averaging about four a day.

Janila Jean, 18, carries her daughter as she walks to her friend's house in Jacmel, Haiti. Jean said she was a 16-year-old virgin when a U.N. peacekeeper from Brazil lured her to the U.N. compound with a smear of peanut butter on bread, then raped her at gunpoint and left her pregnant. Associated Press/Dieu Nalio Chery

From 2004 to 2007, nine Haitian children were exploited by a child sex ring involving at least 134 Sri Lankan peacekeepers, according to a U.N. report obtained by The Associated Press.

Often the children were given cookies or a few dollars in exchange for sex. Although 114 of the peacekeepers were sent home, none was ever jailed for the abuse.

Justice for victims is rare. An Associated Press investigation of U.N. missions during the past 12 years found an estimated 2,000 allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeepers and U.N. personnel around the world — signaling the crisis is much larger than previously known. More than 300 of the allegations involved children, the AP found, but only a fraction of the alleged perpetrators were jailed.

SADLY FAMILIAR RING

In March, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres announced new measures to tackle peacekeeper misconduct. But the proclamation had a depressingly familiar ring: More than a decade ago, the United Nations commissioned a report that promised to do much the same thing, yet most of the reforms never materialized.

For a full two years after those promises were made, the children in Haiti were passed around from soldier to soldier. And in the years since, peacekeepers have been accused of sexual abuse the world over.

In response to the AP’s investigation, the head of the U.N. office that oversees the conduct of peacekeepers said Wednesday progress was being made with member states to hold perpetrators accountable.

“Every single allegation of sexual exploitation and abuse by U.N. personnel, be it uniformed or civilian, is appalling,” Under-Secretary-General for Field Support Atul Khare said. “Everyone, especially us, are aware of the shortcomings in the system. We believe we are advancing in the right direction, especially with the secretary-general’s new approach.

U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been calling for reforms in the U.N. for more than a year. He may well get them under President Donald Trump, whose administration has proposed a 31 percent reduction to the U.S. foreign aid and diplomacy budget.

“If I heard that a U.N. peacekeeping mission was coming near my home in Chattanooga,” he told AP, “I’d be on the first plane out of here to go back and protect my family.”

ORPHANED AND ABANDONED

The Haitian children had made a home for themselves at Habitation Leclerc, a resort was once well-known throughout Port-au-Prince as a lush refuge amid the capital’s grimy alleyways. During its heyday in the 1980s, celebrities like Mick Jagger and Jackie Onassis would perch by the pool or stroll past the property’s Voodoo temple.

By 2004, the resort was a decrepit clutch of buildings and several children, either orphaned or abandoned by their parents, were living in its ruins.

It was there that the girl identified as Victim No. 1, or V01, met other children in the same straits: two young girls referred to in the U.N. report as “V02” and “V03,” and a young boy, “V08.” The boy initially supported them by occasionally bringing food from his aunt, but they were often hungry.

The peacekeepers arrived as part of a new mission to help stabilize the country in the wake of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s ouster. Some of the peacekeepers in the Sri Lankan contingent were based nearby.

In August 2007, the U.N. received complaints of “suspicious interactions” between Sri Lankan soldiers and Haitian children.

V02, who was 16 when the U.N. team interviewed her, told them she had sex with a Sri Lankan commander at least three times, describing him as overweight with a mustache and a gold ring. She said he often showed her a picture of his wife.

V03 identified 11 Sri Lankan troops through photographs, one of whom she said was a corporal with a “distinctive” bullet scar between his armpit and waist. V04, who was 14, said she had sex with the soldiers every day.

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