EXPERTS are meeting tomorrow to discuss ways of combating the sick trade in Internet child porn.

A mini summit is being held in the North-East, organised by children's charity Barnardo's.

The conference, being held in Middlesbrough, will explore the latest developments in the prevention and detection of child sex abuse.

Its aims will be to discuss the detection of Internet sexual abuse, consider what is needed to assess the problem, intervention and analysis of current and planned legal solutions.

News of the conference comes only a week after Cleveland Police revealed they had arrested 24 people as part of the worldwide Operation Ore hunt for paedophiles trading in Internet pictures of children.

They seized 60 computers and distressing images of children aged between six months to 16 years; the images ranging from a dozen to more than 50,000.

The audience attending the conference will be professionals working in health, social care and criminal justice; people who are involved with children at risk of, or who have been sexually abused.

Among the guest speakers will be Tink Palmer, Barnardo's national principal policy and practice officer and Wendy Shepherd, who runs Barnardo's SECOS (Sexually Exploited Children On the Streets) which works with children abused through prostitution.

Other speakers include Dr Alistair Gillespie, a senior lecturer at the University of Teesside, Middlesbrough, who is a member of the Internet Task Force for Child Protection, Detective Inspector Terry Jones of Greater Manchester Police's Abusive Images Unit and PC Paul Higgins of Cleveland Police.

The conference - Altered Images - is being held at Barnardo's Bridgeway project in Middlesbrough which works with children who have been abused.