Australian police have arrested 70 people in nationwide child pornography raids.

The arrests follow a six-month investigation into online paedophile communities and how they trade images of child pornography on the internet.

Those arrested include a policeman and a teacher, and more arrests are likely, police said.

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty said some of the images showed children being abused, adding: "These are not children in passive poses. You will see more arrests, the investigations are continuing."

Police said the investigation started when a hacker infiltrated a respectable European website and placed 99 explicit images of young girls from eastern Europe, the United States and Paraguay.

The site got 12 million hits worldwide in the three days that followed and police traced some of those back to home addresses in Australia.

© Independent Television News Limited 2008. All rights reserved.