19 January 2012
analysis
Nairobi — At end-November 2011, Somalia and the Central African Republic became the latest countries to commit to end the use of child soldiers - a move seen as "encouraging" by the UN, albeit with the proviso that the situation in both countries remains volatile.
All sides to the Somali conflict have reportedly been recruiting children. An official working with an NGO that monitors the state of children in the country told IRIN that although the exact number of child soldiers was unknown, his group suspected between 2,000 and 3,000 children were in different armed groups.
Up to 300,000 children are still involved in more than 30 conflicts worldwide, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).
In April 2011, the UN listed dozens of groups that continued to recruit or use children in its annual report on children and armed conflict. This bid to "name and shame" countries into cooperating with the law has only a limited effect, however. While fewer children are being used as child soldiers today, it is thanks to conflicts having ended, not the practice of recruiting and using children.
"Despite some examples of progress, the bigger picture remains essentially unaltered: the recruitment and use of boys and girls by armed groups remains widespread," according to the latest report by the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers in 2008.
Gender is no protection, as girls are recruited into armed groups or abducted for forced labour or sex. Age also proved no barrier; in Columbia, the FARC militia announced it would recruit all children over the age of eight, reported the UN Secretary-General in April 2011: "In one characteristic use of children, a child was used by FARC-EP to carry out an attack against a police station using explosives. The explosives were attached to the child and activated as he approached the police station, killing him instantly."
Defenceless
"Many children have few alternatives to, or defences against, joining armed groups," states the 2008 Coalition report. It cited poverty, discrimination and social exclusion, lack of access to education, and limited job prospects as some of the factors pushing minors to join armed groups.
Not all children associated with armed forces are used as fighters. Minors have been seen manning checkpoints, acting as scouts and guides in battles, running errands, cooking and cleaning for forces during the Côte d'Ivoire election conflict, according to government social workers, UN agency and NGO staff, as well as direct testimonies from children. Social workers in Duékoué, in the west, told NGO Save the Children they saw children involved whom they estimated to be as young as 11.
Suicide bombers
Children have also been made to carry explosives between Afghanistan and Pakistan, conduct military operations in the DRC, Philippines, Myanmar and Somalia, carry out arson attacks and collect kidnap ransoms in Haiti; they were used as suicide bombers in Iraq, according to the Secretary-General's 2010 report, as well as Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Augustin Habyaremye was forcibly recruited into one of the Democratic Republic of Congo's (DRC) armed groups, the Mai-Mai PARECO, at 15, and tasked with quizzing local villagers about the movements of militia forces because of his knowledge of Kinyarwanda, an official language of Rwanda. He cannot remember how many skirmishes and battles he was involved in during his six years with them, but in July 2011 he managed to slip away and was brought to the demobilization camp in the eastern DRC city of Goma, in search of "a normal life".
According to a Foreign Policy Association blog: "The use of child suicide bombers appears to be increasing, and while many children are educated and reared into this deadly fate, many are thankfully saved or removed before their actions have deadly consequences. Many have seen the images of infants and toddlers dressed in mock suicide bomber outfits in Palestine, and while they may not commit such acts when they grow up, their fate is one undoubtedly leaning towards violence."
Laws not applied
There are various instruments outlawing the recruitment and use of children for combat in human rights law, humanitarian law, labour law and criminal law - but a chasm exists between these standards and their application. The Coalition report cites ineffective government and a lack of enforcement mechanisms as reasons why armed groups continued to operate with relative impunity.
Although child soldiers are used all over the world, the largest numbers are in Africa, despite the 1999 African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, the only regional treaty in the world that prohibits the use of child soldiers.
Most observers agree that the practice continues because children make for cheap and obedient fighters, easily frightened or brainwashed into compliance. The accessibility of light weaponry has also fed into the problem, making it possible for very young children to bear and use arms.
"Any country that has an active armed conflict can expect that troop-hungry commanders will use children to fill their ranks," said professor, author and psychologist Michael Wessells in a United States Department of State webchat in June 2008.
But all agree that the most obvious reason armed forces take on children is because they can. Despite the regulations outlawing the practice, most of those who violate the conventions and international agreements are not prosecuted.
Children who have been displaced or separated from their parents, have limited access to education, or who have suffered an injustice or emotional abuse, are more vulnerable to recruitment, according to UNICEF.
Among other things, protection involves addressing these vulnerabilities, and identifying non-violent ways for them to contribute to their families and communities. Resources and capacity are particularly needed to extend education and vocational training, as well as to revive agriculture and provide other economic opportunities, according to the UN.
Demobilizing, reintegrating and rehabilitating children who have already participated in armed conflict is as difficult as protecting them. "Children who transition successfully into civilian life are less likely to continue the life of the gun, with its inherent dangers. However, instability in the post-conflict environment can put children at grave risk of re-recruitment and thwart their reintegration," Wessells wrote in his 2006 book, Child Soldiers: from violence to protection.
The effects on children
Child soldiers are subject to ill-treatment and sexual exploitation. They are often forced to commit terrible atrocities, and beaten or killed if they try to escape. They are subjected to brutal initiation and punishment rituals, hard labour, cruel training regimes and torture. Many are given drugs and alcohol to agitate them and make it easier to break down their psychological barriers to fighting or committing atrocities.
Some speak of having been forced to witness or commit atrocities, including rape and murder. Others speak of seeing friends and family killed. Susan, 16, captures the brutalization children suffered at the hands of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in northern Uganda in the following testimony :
"One boy tried to escape but he was caught. His hands were tied and then they made us, the other new captives, kill him with a stick. I felt sick. I knew this boy from before; we were from the same village. I refused to do it and they told me they would shoot me. They pointed a gun at me, so I had to do it... I see him in my dreams and he is saying I killed him for nothing, and I am crying."
"Fighting groups have developed brutal and sophisticated techniques to separate and isolate children from their communities. Children are often terrorized into obedience, consistently made to fear for their lives and well-being," wrote the UN's Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict. "Sometimes they are compelled to participate in the killing of other children or family members, because it is understood by these groups that there is 'no way back home' for children after they have committed such crimes."
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