A group of United Nations (UN) Independent Human Rights experts says the Epstein Files contain disturbing and credible evidence of systematic and large-scale sexual abuse, trafficking and exploitation of women and girls that could amount to crimes against humanity.

The nine experts, who serve as Special Rapporteurs appointed by the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, warned that these acts could amount to sexual slavery, reproductive violence, enforced disappearance, torture, inhuman and degrading treatment and femicide.

The group argued further that despite the disclosures in the reams of documents released by the United States Justice Department, accountability had been limited.

 Among the group of experts are the Special Rapporteurs on violence against women and girls, on the right to privacy and on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order.

They released a hard hitting statement saying the crimes contained in the files were committed against a backdrop of supremacist beliefs, racism, corruption, extreme misogyny and the commodification and dehumanisation of women and girls from different parts of the world.

They further argue that the Epstein Files are suggestive of the existance of a global criminal enterprise that has shocked the concscience of humanity and raised terrifying implications of the level of impunity for such crimes.

Their statement says that so grave was the scale, nature, systematic character, and transnational reach of these atrocities against women and girls, that a number of them may reasonably meet the legal threshold of crimes against humanity.

They explained that under international criminal law, crimes against humanity occured when acts such as sexual slavery, rape, enforced prostitution, trafficking, persecution, torture or murder were committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack against a civilian population.

The experts warned that the components reported may meet this threshold and that these crimes must be prosecuted in all competent national and international courts.

–SABC–