Ellen O'Malley-Dunlop, chief executive officer of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre (DRCC), said that a major part of the DRCC's work this year would be to focus on the link between increased access to online and hard-copy pornography and attacks against women.

"We are seeing a level of violence not before seen. Our counsellors are telling us that the types of things being done are so disturbing that they could not be made up, they are some form of recreation from pornographic material, " O'Malley-Dunlop told the Sunday Tribune.

New Department of Justice figures seen by the Sunday Tribune show an increase of more than one-third in rapes and sexual assaults against women in Dublin's north inner-city in 2006, compared to the previous 12 months. The new data follows reports last week which also showed a dramatic rise in rapes over the Christmas period.

The figures were obtained by independent TD Tony Gregory, following what he described as "considerable local concern at the apparent surge in violent attacks and gang rapes against women in Dublin north central".

In 2005, there were 48 offences recorded over the three categories of oral and anal rape; sexual assualt; and rape of a female.

In 2006, there were 67 recorded attacks.

Gregory said that his query to the department arose from a series of instances involving a vicious gang-rape of a woman in the city centre recently.

O'Malley-Dunlop said that the DRCC recognised that focusing on the links between violent sexual assault and abusive pornographic material was a complex objective. "It is a fine line between the erotic, somthing that may be artistic, and pornography that differentiates women as being something beneath and subservient to men. Any debate regarding the line separating these two different representations is a complex one".