MSF aid workers in Africa 'used prostitutes': BBC report

Aid workers for charity Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) used prostitutes in Africa, a BBC report said today citing anonymous whistleblowers who also reported boasts of trading medicine for sex.

The NGO said it took the allegations seriously but said it had been unable to confirm the claims and urged anyone with information to come forward.

The allegations follow a crisis at British charity Oxfam over claims that its workers used prostitutes while stationed in Haiti after the devastating 2010 earthquake.

A former employee based in MSF's London office told the BBC she had seen a senior staff member bring girls back to MSF accommodation while posted in Kenya.

"The girls were very young and rumoured to be prostitutes," she said, adding that it was "implicit" that they were there for sex.

She said some of the older, long-standing male aid workers took advantage of their positions. "I felt that, with some of the older guys, there was definitely an abuse of power," she said. "They'd been there for a long time and took advantage of their exalted status as a Western aid worker."
She questioned what the charity knew, saying: "There's definitely a feeling that certain predatory men were seen as too big to fail."
"He said, 'Oh it's so easy. It's so easy to barter medication with these easy girls in Liberia'," she told the programme. "He was suggesting lots of the young girls who had lost their parents to the Ebola crisis, that they would do anything sexual in return for medication."
In a statement, the agency said, "We do not tolerate abuse, harassment or exploitation within MSF."