“My mother was against my joining the soldiers in our town. But when she was killed by the rebels, I had to do something. Also we had no food, nothing to eat, but the soldiers always had more food. It was how I became part of the soldiers” (Francis 7).
In the world, there are about 300,000 children recruited as child soldiers (Hill 1). One-third of this number of children fight and serve for the government military or rebel groups in Africa (Hill 1). “According to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, child soldiers are defined as all children engaged in hostilities under age 18. Although they are under 18, the roles of children in armed conflict are not limited because of their young age. Some children fight on the front lines of combat. Others perform manual labor, such as digging trenches, working in the kitchen, or carrying food, ammunition, or other supplies, often for long distances. Still others, primarily female children and adolescents, are reduced to sexual servants for military and rebel leaders” (Hill 1).
War Child started in 1999 is based of United Kingdom. War Child’s mission is to reinforce and enhance the protection and livelihoods of children living in an insecure and poor environment.”
This paper will analyze, critique, and offer improvements for improving the lives of child soldiers in Africa: providing social services and aids to ensure children’s mental and physical health care, helping the reunification of former child soldiers with family members, and providing educational and vocational skill programs for their reintegration into the civil society.
Child soldiers undergo post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after participating in armed conflicts (Hill 1). For child soldiers to ...
... middle of paper ...
...014, from http://www.warchild.org.uk/
Angucia, M. (2009, September 1). Children and war in Africa: the crisis continues in northern Uganda.(Report). International Journal on World Peace , 26, 95.
Francis, D. J. (2007). ‘Paper Protection’ Mechanisms: Child Soldiers And The International Protection Of Children In Africa's Conflict Zones. The Journal of Modern African Studies, 45(02), 207.
Hill, K., & Langholtz, H. (2003). Rehabilitation Programs For African Child Soldiers. Peace Review, 15(3), 279-285.
Stark, L., Boothby, N., & Ager, A. (2009). Children and fighting forces: 10 years on from Cape Town. Disasters, 33(4), 522-547.
Zack-Williams, T. (2006). Child soldiers in Sierra Leone and the problems of demobilisation, rehabilitation and reintegration into society: some lessons for social workers in war-torn societies. The International Journal, 25(2), 119-128.
Think about how your life was when you were ten. For most people, the only worries were whether you finished your homework and if you’ve been recently updated for new games. Unfortunately, in Sierra Leone, kids at the age of ten were worried about if that day was the only day they’d be able to breathe. The cause of one of this devastating outcome is Sierra Leone’s Civil War. This war was a long bloody fight that took many lives and hopes of children and families.
I was in the grips of genocide, and there was nothing I could do. Operation No Living Thing was put into full effect (Savage 33). The R.U.F., however, was not alone in servicing children as their own messengers of evil, the military group countering their acts of violence also had children fighting their battles. A Long Way Gone and The Bite of the Mango are eye-opening books because they give people all over the world a glimpse into the horrors kids in Africa face on a daily basis. However different Mariatu Kamara and Ishmael Beah’s experiences were regarding their journeys and disabilities, they both exhibited the same extraordinary resilience in the end to better themselves, create futures they could be proud of, and make the best of what the war left them.
Capturing children and turning them into child soldiers is an increasing epidemic in Sierra Leone. Ishmael Beah, author of the memoir A Long Way Gone, speaks of his time as a child soldier. Beah was born in Sierra Leone and at only thirteen years old he was captured by the national army and turned into a “vicious soldier.” (Beah, Bio Ref Bank) During the time of Beah’s childhood, a civil war had erupted between a rebel group known as the Revolutionary United Front and the corrupt Sierra Leone government. It was during this time when the recruitment of child soldiers began in the war. Ishmael Beah recalls that when he was only twelve years old his parents and two brothers were killed by the rebel group and he fled his village. While he and his friends were on a journey for a period of months, Beah was captured by the Sierra Leonean Army. The army brainwashed him, as well as other children, with “various drugs that included amphetamines, marijuana, and brown brown.” (Beah, Bio Ref Bank) The child soldiers were taught to fight viciously and the effects of the drugs forced them to carry out kill orders. Beah was released from the army after three years of fighting and dozens of murders. Ishmael Beah’s memoir of his time as a child soldier expresses the deep struggle between his survival and any gleam of hope for the future.
“Child Soldiers Global Report 2001- Sierra Leone.” refworld. Child Soldiers International, 2001. Web. 4 Dec. 2013.
...be seen as an entity that promotes vile results. However, it is imperative to understand that globalization is multilayered and difficult to fully understand. In the case of child soldiers, globalization has played a pertinent role in unifying international organizations in hopes of finding a solution to this “phenomenon”. On the other hand, although certain international organizations such as United Nations have had a prominent role in advocating against child soldiery, for the following reasons, its attempts are insufficient: it lacks the ability to enforce sanctions established within the international community and it does not do enough to recognize the political, social and economic inequalities that are prevalent in most of these fragile states. Therefore, child soldiery, cannot be eradicated until these issues are dealt with on a collective global scale.
In order to understand the effects that come with being a child soldier, one must first understand how a child ends up in such a position. To three teenage boys living in a small Indian village, the hope of a better life for themselves and their families as well as the affirmation of employment seemed promising. So pr...
Machel, Graca & Sebastian Salgado. The Impact of War on Children. London: C. Hurst, 2001.
Child soldier is a worldwide issue, but it became most critical in the Africa. Child soldiers are any children under the age of 18 who are recruited by some rebel groups and used as fighters, cooks, messengers, human shields and suicide bombers, some of them even under the aged 10 when they are forced to serve. Physically vulnerable and easily intimidated, children typically make obedient soldiers. Most of them are abducted or recruited by force, and often compelled to follow orders under threat of death. As society breaks down during conflict, leaving children no access to school, driving them from their homes, or separating them from family members, many children feel that rebel groups become their best chance for survival. Others seek escape from poverty or join military forces to avenge family members who have been killed by the war. Sometimes they even forced to commit atrocities against their own family (britjob p 4 ). The horrible and tragic fate of many unfortunate children is set on path of war murders and suffering, more nations should help to prevent these tragedies and to help stop the suffering of these poor, unfortunate an innocent children.
Taylor, Rupert. “The Plight of Child Soldiers.” Suite 101. Media Inc., 11 May 2009. Web. 15 Feb. 2011. .
These are the words of a 15-year-old girl in Uganda. Like her, there are an estimated 300,000 children under the age of eighteen who are serving as child soldiers in about thirty-six conflict zones (Shaikh). Life on the front lines often brings children face to face with the horrors of war. Too many children have personally experienced or witnessed physical violence, including executions, death squad killings, disappearances, torture, arrest, sexual abuse, bombings, forced displacement, destruction of home, and massacres. Over the past ten years, more than two million children have been killed, five million disabled, twelve million left homeless, one million orphaned or separated from their parents, and ten million psychologically traumatized (Unicef, “Children in War”). They have been robbed of their childhood and forced to become part of unwanted conflicts. In African countries, such as Chad, this problem is increasingly becoming a global issue that needs to be solved immediately. However, there are other countries, such as Sierra Leone, where the problem has been effectively resolved. Although the use of child soldiers will never completely diminish, it has been proven in Sierra Leone that Unicef's disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration program will lessen the amount of child soldiers in Chad and prevent their use in the future.
Wells, Karen C.. "Children and youth at war." Childhood in a global perspective. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2009. 152. Print.
Interestingly, the United Nations Children Fund created a broader definition when it came to child soldiers; where as, the Cape Town Principles defined a narrower version of child soldiers. This stems from the fact that the Cape Town Principles was applicable in regional areas within Africa and had no international capabilities. Policy makers are able to create a narrowed version of the United Nations definition; whereas, the United Nations needs to abide by one definition and make sure that it was and continues to be applicable in most instances of child soldiers (Poulatova, 2013). Even though the two definitions are distinctly different, they can both be applied to a varying degree of children fighting in armed conflict.
In some African countries, children are often used as child soldiers, either because they have nowhere to live, are orphans, have nowhere to live, they volunteered, or because they were forced. Some audience may believe that child soldiers are criminals, and some should be tried and because of war crimes they have committed, but they can also be victims because they are taken advantage of and used in ways that are inhumane. One reason on how they are victims is because they don’t really know the impact on the things they are doing. In the article titled, “Prosecuting Child Soldiers For Their Own Safety.” Stephen Leahy quotes Vesselin Popovski saying, “Child soldiers are both victims and perpetrators.
Alli Craig Mr. Ruddy AP Language March 14, 2015 Growing Up In the Wrong Arms Africa as a continent for many years has been associated with the immoral use of child soldiers, in closer detail, South Sudan, Uganda and Ethiopia. Many people around the world are uncertain or totally obvious to child soldiers or in reality child slavery. Any person under 18 years of age who is part of any kind of regular or irregular armed forces or armed groups in any capacity is considered a child soldiers. The harsh treatment of these kids is recognized by many support groups one being the UNICEF, groups can work everyday to get to the bottom of this harsh labor but until the armed trades stops there will always a way to place a gun In a child’s hand
Today, an estimated three hundred thousand children under age eighteen are participating in armed conflicts worldwide. The life of a child soldier is filled with terror, violence, horrible living conditions, lack of proper sanitization and poor nutrition. Children are forced by commanders through false promises and manipulation, to kill innocent civilians, other children and even their own families. “Shooting became just like drinking a glass of water” said Ishmael Beah, an ex-child-soldier, “children who refused to fight, kill or showed any weakness were ruthlessly dealt with.” In the last ten years over two million children have been killed, over one million orphaned, over six million have been left seriously injured or permanently disabled and over 10 million have been diagnosed with psychological trauma.