Children Soldiers in the World
by Jessica Galacki
March 2010
In the world, there are many types of child slavery. One form is children soldiers. Children soldiers are both boys and girls. This happens in Africa, Asia, Middle East, Europe, and Latin America. Even though this is happening in the world there are organizations to help stop it.
What are Child Soldiers, The Use, And What They Do?
Child soldiers are any person under the age of 18 who is a member of or attached to government armed forces or any other regular or irregular armed force or armed political group, whether or not an armed conflict exists. There are more than 300, 000 and possibly more children soldiers in more than 85 countries.2 There are three uses for children in the military. One is children can take direct part in hostilities like a soldier. Another is they can be used as a support roles such as cooks, porters, spies, messengers, look outs, and sexual slaves. The last form is they can be used for political advantage either as human shields or in propaganda.
Both girls and boys are child soldiers. In some ways they have different roles but in some countries they have the same. They are sometimes asked to even hurt their own family and neighbors to ensure they are “stigmatized” and are unable to go back to their home community. Girls are usually recruited for sexual reason, combat, laying explosives, portering, and performing domestic tasks. Boys are usually recruited for combat but sometimes they are used for sex. They are forced to sometimes even rape and murder civilians using assault weapons like AK-47s and G4s. Some children are also used for suicide missions.
Why Children and Used and Why They Join?
The reason children are used is that they are easily manipulated. A majority of the children in the army volunteer to join. Some feel it is the only option for them. Other reasons are economic, social, community, and family structures. Also some children join so they can avenge the killing of loved ones. Some join because of poverty, lack of access to educational or work opportunities. Girls sometimes join so that they can escape domestic servitude, enforced marriage, or domestic violence, exploitation, and abuse. Some join to uphold a family honor. Also some children are forced to join because of abduction.
What’s it like for a Girl Soldier?
A girl soldier had a seven day schedule that included training, duties, and daily activities. They differed day by day and would start either at 4am or 5am and ended at 10pm. The training was rigorous and demanding. Basic training lasted three to five months. Then a more expansive period of training that lasted five to six months. Also they had a “dummy gun” that was always with them. When punished they were forced to do an extra rounds of exercises, given a riffle and had to have it over their head and do sitting to standing exercises, and they were hit and kicked without mercy.
Where the Child Soldiers are used?
The use of children in the military takes place in Africa, Asia, Middle East, Europe, and Latin America. In Africa, child soldiers are being used in armed conflict in Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda. In Asia thousands of children are involved in fighting forces in active conflict and ceasefire situations. Child soldiers exist in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Nepal, the Philippines, and Thailand, where they are mainly associated with armed opposition groups, factional or clan based groups or groups composed of ethnic or religious minorities. In Sri Lanka, hundreds, perhaps thousands of children are believed to remain in the ranks of the main opposition force and forcible recruitment continues. In the Middle East child soldiers are reportedly used in Iran, Iraq, and Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories and in tribal groups in Yemen. In Latin America, children are involved with armed political groups and army backed paramilitaries in Colombia. Also in Europe, children under 18s are believed to be involved in Turkey and in armed groups in the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation. Africa has the largest number of child soldiers with around 200,000 children. In Latin America there are up to 14,000 children.
The Impact of Being In the Military for A Child
It is difficult to reintegrate demobilized children after a peace settlement is reached. Many children have been abused whether it was physically or sexually, and have seen their parents killed in front of their eyes. These children have no skills for life in peacetime and they are accustomed to getting their way through violence. Recovering from the stresses of soldiering in war are difficult for children; it is extremely hard for girl soldiers who often find stigmatization get in the way of their efforts to return to peacetime lives. Michael Wessells, author of the book Child Soldiers: From Violence to Protection said:
Often girl soldiers are forced into exclusive sexual relationships by their captors. When babies result, the girls, who might have found a measure of protection in these unions, regard the fathers as “real” husbands, Wessells said. But these so-called “bush marriages” don’t endure in peacetime, he added, especially in rebel groups, because the couples are seen by their communities as having chosen to continue a military lifestyle rather than integrate into civilian life. Heartbreak faces even those former girl soldiers with children who can find new husbands in peacetime. In West Africa and other parts of rural sub-Sahara Africa, the new husband often will not accept the children of his wife’s previous relationships, Wessells said. Those children are sent away to family members willing to take them; often they are marginalized or exploited.
Stories Of Past Children Soldiers
"I would like you to give a message. Please do your best to tell the world what is happening to us, the children. So that other children don't have to pass through this violence." Said a 15-year-old girl, who ended an interview to Amnesty International with this plea. She was forcibly abducted at night from her home by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), an armed opposition movement fighting the Ugandan Government. She was made to kill a boy who tried to escape. She saw another boy being hacked to death for not raising the alarm when a friend ran away. She was beaten when she dropped a water container and ran for cover under gunfire. She received 35 days of military training and was sent to fight the government army.
"I feel so bad about the things that I did. It disturbs me so much that I inflicted death on other people. When I go home I must do some traditional rites because I have killed. I must perform these rites and cleanse myself. I still dream about the boy from my village that I killed. I see him in my dreams, and he is talking to me, saying I killed him for nothing, and I am crying." Said a 16-year-old girl after demobilization from an armed group.
"When they came to my village, they asked my older brother whether he was ready to join the militia. He was just 17 and he said no; they shot him in the head. Then they asked me if I was ready to sign, so what could I do - I didn't want to die." Said a former child soldier taken when he was 13.
"Early on when my brothers and I were captured, the LRA [Lord's Resistance Army] explained to us that all five brothers couldn’t serve in the LRA because we would not perform well. So they tied up my two younger brothers and invited us to watch. Then they beat them with sticks until two of them died. They told us it would give us strength to fight. My youngest brother was nine years old." Said a former child soldier, aged 13.
"There was no one in charge of the dormitories and on a nightly basis we were raped. The men and youths would come into our dormitory in the dark, and they would just rape us - you would just have a man on top of you, and you could not even see who it was. If we cried afterwards, we were beaten with hosepipes. We were so scared that we did not report the rapes The youngest girl in our group was aged 11 and she was raped repeatedly in the base." Said a 19-year-old girl describing her experience in the National Youth Service Training Program.
We can help stop children being used as soldiers. You can donate to organizations like Plan USA or Coalition To Stop the Use of Children Soldiers. If you cannot donate then you can use Everyclick as your search engine every search qualifies for a percentage share of the profits. Also there is Easyfundraising which is a shopping directory listing over 400 of the UK's best known retailers, and all you do is use the links provided on the easyfundraising site whenever you shop online, and each retailer will make a free contribution to the Coalition for every purchase you make. You can also start you own fundraiser and then donate the money. You can also write a letter to the government and tell them.
Sources Used:
1.http://www.childsoldiers.org/childsoldiers/questions-and-answers.
2.http://www.worldrevolution.org/guidepage/childsoldiers/intro.
3.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_use_of_children.
4.http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2008/12/03/facts-about-child-soldiers.
5.http://www.amnestyusa.org/children/child-soldiers/about-child-soldiers/page.do?id=1021176.
6.http://www.childsoldiers.org/childsoldiers/some-facts
7.http://www.child-soldiers.org/childsoldiers/why-children-join
8.http://www.quno.org/newyork/Resources/QUNOchildsoldiers.pdf
9.http://www.unicef.org/graca/kidsoldi.htm
10.http://www.america.gov/st/hrenglish/2008/May/20080508144836ajesrom0.4115412.html
11.http://www.childsoldiers.org/childsoldiers/child-soldiers.
12.http://www.childsoldiers.org/childsoldiers/voices-of-young-soldiers
13.http://www.childsoldiers.org/get_involved/everyclick
14.http://www.childsoldiers.org/get_involved/easyfundraising.