Berlin, Sept. 27 (Reuters): German officials called today for tougher sentences for consumers of child pornography after police cracked a huge global child porn network involving some 26,500 Internet users in 166 countries.

“The latest investigation successes have shown once again what sort of disgusting acts people are capable of,” Fritz Rudolf Koerper, junior interior minister, told Welt am Sonntag newspaper according to a release ahead of Sunday publication.

“We must deal with them severely. I propose a coordinated increase of sentences Europe-wide,” Koerper said, adding he wanted more international cooperation on fighting the ways such material was spread on the Internet.

Police said on Friday they had cracked a porn ring using computer files seized last year in Germany, including a huge distribution list, via which suspected paedophiles swapped pornographic images of children as young as four months.