European Union

The European Union (EU) is a politico-economic union of 28 member states that are located primarily in Europe. The EU operates through a system of supranational institutions and intergovernmental negotiated decisions by the member states. The institutions are: the European Commission, the Council of the European Union, the European Council, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Central Bank, the Court of Auditors, and the European Parliament. The European Parliament is elected every five years by EU citizens.

On 13 December 2011, the European Union issued a directive "on combating the sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of children and child pornography" which stated, "Rules on jurisdiction should be amended to ensure that sexual abusers or sexual exploiters of children from the Union face prosecution even if they commit their crimes outside the Union, in particular via so-called sex tourism. . . . Child pornography, which constitutes child sexual abuse images, is a specific type of content which cannot be construed as the expression of an opinion. To combat it, it is necessary to reduce the circulation of child sexual abuse material by making it more difficult for offenders to upload such content onto the publicly accessible web. Action is therefore necessary to remove the content and apprehend those guilty of making, distributing or downloading child sexual abuse images."