PHNOM Penh Municipal Court yesterday heard an in absentia case against a Spanish national charged with purchasing child prostitution.

Francisco Pellicer Caules, 57, was arrested and detained in Spain in September of last year, on suspicion of purchasing sex from a 14-year-old boy who had been employed as a cleaner at his rented home in Phnom Penh’s Prampi Makara district, officials said. Prosecutors yesterday called for the suspect to be brought to Cambodia to face the charges.