Japanese children’s cartoon Crayon Shin-chan branded pornography in Indonesia

With his penchant for mooning and blurting out risque spoonerisms, Crayon Shin-chan has delighted Japanese children, and infuriated their parents, for more than two decades.

But now the precocious five-year-old has met his match in the form of Indonesian regulators, who have declared his antics as “borderline pornography” and warned broadcasters to censor images of his bare buttocks, scantily clad women and other indecorous scenes.

The Indonesian broadcasting commission has told RCTI, the private television network that airs the Crayon Shin-chan series, to either cut “indecent” parts of the programme or show it at a later time, when it will be missed by many in its target audience: young children.

A member of the commission insisted the cartoon, which has also been shown in Spain, Malaysia and several other countries, was not intended for young audiences.

“The character fools around with his bare bottom exposed,” Agatha Lily told Japan’s Asahi newspaper. “He also noses around people [when they are] on dates. The show features a lot of female characters in seductive garments that emphasise their cleavage.

“It is essentially pornography.”