UN applaud Govt's efforts to protect children

By Dinesh Weerawansa

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has commended the Sri Lankan Government's efforts in protecting interests of children by taking several measures, including the creation of a special task force on children.

In his latest report released yesterday, covering the period from 1 November 2006 to 14 September 2007, the United Nations Chief applauded the Government's creation of a special task force on children and armed conflict last April, and called on authorities to take further measures to prevent armed groups' abduction and recruitment of children as soldiers and to secure the release of current child soldiers.

When contacted, Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said the Government has taken every possible step to prevent child recruitment by the LTTE or any other terrorist group. He said recruitment of child soldiers has been reduced to a greater extent due to appropriate action taken by the Government.

The 20-page report of UN Secretary-General too proves that the recruitment of child soldiers has been reduced considerably. According to Moon's report, LTTE has recruited 262 children (including 32 who were re-recruited) between November 1, 2006 and August 31, 2007. But the report, based on information received by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), said the LTTE has recruited 756 children during the corresponding period of the privious year.

"This represents a significant decrease as compared to the previous 12-month period," the UN report said.

However, Moon said that LTTE terrorists and its breakaway group - Tamil Makkal Viduthali Pulikal (TMVP) continue to abduct children to fight as soldiers. Though there is a significant drop in recruitment as child soldiers, Moon said "both parties have failed to cease the abduction, recruitment and use of children."

He said the LTTE and TMVP have also failed to "release all children associated with their forces and engage in transparent procedures for release and verification," which includes allowing the UN Task Force on monitoring and reporting full access to military locations under their control.

Despite some advances in the dialogue between UNICEF and the LTTE (through the so-called Child Protection Authority of the terrorist outfit which deals with child recruitment issues), there have been several hurdles, such as the LTTE's insistence that only children born after 1 January 1990 - who are 17 years old - would be released. This is in disregard of both international and national legal standards which state that 18 years is the minimum age of recruitment.The report also stated that the number of children recruited by the TMVP/Karuna faction between 1 November 2006 and 31 August 2007 was 207.

"Despite initial engagement on an action plan, the TMVP/Karuna faction demonstrated bad faith on a number of occasions, including leading the United Nations to a falsified training camp in Batticaloa and re-recruiting children within days of releasing them in the presence of UNICEF," the report stated.

"As of September, 2007, the TMVP/Karuna faction has not demonstrated a full commitment to stop recruiting children and has not released all children within their ranks," it added.

dinesh@sundayobserver.lk