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| Sunday, 26 October 2003 |
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Child soldiers still being recruited By Shanika Sriyananda Over 1,189 child soldiers below the age of 16, recruited by the LTTE from the North and East, are still in LTTE custody, UNICEF official told the Sunday Observer. According to UNICEF's data of over 1,775 cases of underage recruitment had been reported till October. These cases had also been reported to the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR) and other partner organisations. While 22 children have been recruited by the LTTE upto October 15, official pointed out that 80 child soldiers from the Ampara District and the 383 from Batticaloa were still in LTTE custody. However, 13 children below the age of 16, were handed over to their families, on October 15. Another seven were released in Ampara, last Saturday. Sarah Epstein, UNICEF Communication officer said that the Action Plan for Children Affected by War signed by both the government and the LTTE was a great opportunity for the LTTE to hand over child soldiers to their families. " For the Action Plan to be successful all new recruitment of children has to stop", she stressed. Commenting on new recruitment, she said that it was a gross violation of children's rights and is completely unacceptable." UNICEF has continuously been calling for an end to recruitment and child soldiers in Sri Lanka", she said adding that the UNICEF has been fully exercising its mandate of ensuring that no child under 18 is in the armed group. She also said that giving a top priority to the issue of underage recruitment, the UNICEF has taken number of effective advocacy tools to make the country free of child soldiers. She added that the UNICEF monitor every child handed over to the family and have requested the parents of missing children to lodge their complaints to the UNICEF and other relevant authorities to trace their whereabouts. |
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