For whose child do the bells toll?

Children have become direct agents of war, throughout the world. These children are often subjected to appalling brutality and are denied their childhood and innocence. They are abducted, recruited and forced to bear arms and do tasks such as frontline combat, join suicide missions, serve as human mine detectors and spying.

Child soldiers suffer higher casualties than their mature partners in crime as they're physically vulnerable. Thus, their future is a mere blur as the war leaves them physically crippled and psychologically traumatized, their rights as children, violated beyond explanation
 

by Umangi de Mel

The child soldier phenomena is something that's come to our attention in the last couple of decades for various reasons. But we also find that the widespread use of small arms and their easy availability have changed the whole nature of warfare. Unlike in the past, now weapons are so light and mobile that it's easy for children to use them. This has increased the problem of children being involved in conflict. Outstanding case

The actual database was started in 2002. Information prior to 2002 are just anecdotal, says JoAnna Van Gerpen, Representative of UNICEF. Talking about their policy since October 2002, she says if a person was under 18 when he/she was recruited that child must be released, allowed to rejoin the family and allowed to have an independent choice to decide about rejoining the LTTE, "Currently we have 1464 cases on our database, out of which 896 are over 18 and 568 are under 18. The case is outstanding at the moment.

The patterns of recruitment in Sri Lanka don't differ so much from those of other countries. There are incidents where children were abducted and forced to join the forces. A number of similar reports particularly come from the Karuna faction in the east in the recent months. Poverty being another cause there are children who voluntarily join because they are being paid.

You find young people whose families are poor and have a hard time supporting the children. They may have dropped out of schools ... Those are the prime targets to volunteer because they see it as an opportunity to get three meals a day. They also get the training and have something to do during the day which is very important for young people. So we do have forced recruitment but we also have a fairly significant number of children who volunteer to join LTTE.

But the LTTE has promised not to take children under 18 into their forces and to release and send the remaining child soldiers home.

The UNICEF says that they aren't tracking or reporting on their training or other tasks of child combatants though . "We don't have any access to the training camps. We are mandated to monitor the recruitment and not go beyond that", they reveal.

There's a great deal of insecurity in the community where actual recruitment is going on says JoAnna.

She says that especially the parents who prefer their kids to pursue school are tensed. "Particularly we see a lot of tension in the East and Batticaloa areas where there's been a lot of forced recruitments from the Karuna faction".

Mental agony

These children who join the forces both by force and voluntarily undergo a severe mental agony as they're being snatched away from the love and warmth of a family to face rigorous military training which moulds them into doing things that are denying them their fundamental rights.

Talking about the methods of reintegration of these children, JoAnna says if they are released and sent home, the UNICEF after verifying that the children have returned home, tries to identify the reasons why the kids joined the LTTE, "If they dropped out of school, there might be mediation with the school to help them go back to school. In case of runaways there's more of the security concern that has to be taken into account.

We have discussions with the family, and the child to try and make sure that they do have a safe location to live."

Having spoken to a very enterprising young woman during her trips to the North-East, JoAnna says that the former had actually volunteered to go in place of her brother who was conscripted. Since he was the source of support to the family she had voluntarily gone but was released after the forces split, "She was trained in tailoring and poultry farming. Now she's been able to contribute to the economical viability of the family. Though she didn't go back to school, she chose to go for vocational training. The LTTE has officially declared that they won't recruit persons under the age of 18.

More abductions

But during the past three months there's been reports of 67 recruitments of child soldiers. There's been a major increase in the number of recruits through the Karuna group. We've not yet got an opportunity to meet with any leaders of the Karuna faction to get a political commitment not to recruit children.

When there's recruitment, there's fear and it affects kids who go to school as parents try to keep them home," points out JoAnna. According to her, abductions increase during the festival season in July, when crowds start coming to the 'kovils'.

She says that it's easy for the forces to take the kids away and convince them either to come voluntarily or to take them involuntarily, "The security forces aren't prepared to try and prevent the kind of abductions or create an environment where people feel safe. They can't live a normal life and fear has a major impact on the whole community", JoAnna stresses.

Welioya attack

"The first incident of child soldiers in Sri Lanka was revealed in 1995 during the Welioya attack where over 300 LTTE cadres were killed on July 28, out of which 90 per cent were children. The incident proved to us as well as to the international media that the LTTE has children in the battle front.

In the LTTE controlled areas there's no organisation where they can go for help, report abductions or recruitments by force. It's not only the LTTE that has child soldiers, but all the breakaway groups as well", says Prasad Samarasinghe, military spokesman talking about the plight of children in the North-East area.

He says that the situation hasn't changed although the LTTE has given their word not to recruit persons under 18, "Most of the children in those areas lack education mainly because of the abductions. There were six families from the LTTE controlled areas today and 57 families last week complaining that their kids were taken by the LTTE.

There are volunteers who get motivated by the uniform and the weapons but majority are taken by force. The LTTE promised the United Nations but hasn't kept their word. It's easy to motivate youngsters to go to the battle front. They're throughly brain washed and are totally ignorant to its complications.

Kids ranging from the age of 10 to 18 are taken and given normal military training, education on the military line and are allowed to fire weapons at times. The training depends on the physical fitness and age.

Children aged 10-11 are used as spies, messengers, to carry items, throw grenades, give early warnings and plant claymore mines. But children from the age of 14 upto 18 are used for military tasks such as intelligence and suicide missions. The LTTE is fully aware that they are violating child rights but continue child abductions maintaining that these children come to them voluntarily.