Law No. Decree No. Although other sources have claimed that the minimum age for voluntary recruitment is in fact 15 years. Angola Peace Monitor , No. V, 27 November Another source reported that at the time of the Lusaka Protocol, the armies registered over 9, minors, of whom 5, were selected for demobilisation.
Most of these youths had been recruited forcibly at 13 or 14 years of age. Wessels, M. In January , child soldiers between the ages of 13 and 17 were demobilized from the Angolan armed forces. This marked the first official demobilisation by the government. Fleming, J.
Belida, A. This grouping is apparently led by Eugeno Manuvakola. See Angola Peace Monitor , No. V, 27 November ; Afrique Express , No. See the later country analysis for the Democratic Republic of Congo. Estimates taken from IISS. Kayaya, M. Mulenga, M.
Africa Confidential , 11 April According to freelance journalist Peter Stranberg, op. Governmental Armed Forces 2 Active: c. Paramilitary : 2, About to 1, persons are conscripted each year.
The government has also maintained that it does not recruit unders. Children in these schools are not members of the armed forces. They are encouraged, but not forced, to pursue a military career after graduation, which usually occurs when they are about 19 or 20 years of age. Pupils are under the responsibility of a civilian teacher who is also the director of studies and a military officer who is also the head of the school.
They receive the same academic education as pupils in other schools but in addition are taught the art of war and given moral and civic instruction. At the end of their studies, they have the option to follow a military or a civil career. In addition, there are two training centres for officers, one in Porto Noveo and the other in Ouidah. The minimum age for entry these schools is There is no armed conflict ongoing in Benin.
IISS estimates. IISS 7. DCI Benin. Recruitment into the armed forces is on a voluntary basis. Only one condition is formally mentioned in this Section, namely to have the apparent age of 18 years.
Section 26 1 of the Botswana Defence Force Act states that "if a person appearing before a recruiting officer for the purpose of being enlisted in the Regular Force knowingly makes a false answer to any question contained in the attestation paper and put to him by or by the direction of the recruiting officer, he shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding P or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both.
It is not known how the legislative requirements are implemented in practice, in particular if and how exact age is determined. There is, however, no evidence of underage recruitment taking place. There is no evidence that any underage soldiers were among the Botswana contingent. Chapter of the Act.
Burkina Faso. Active: 10, Army: 5,; Air Force : 20 Paramilitary: unknown. Article 10 of the Constitution of 11 June states that "Each citizen of Burkina Faso is required to contribute to the defence and preservation of territorial integrity. Each citizen is required to carry out national service upon demand.
According to the State party report to the Committee on the Rights of the Child conscription, known as National Development Service, is compulsory for all. There is no evidence of underage recruitment taking place. There is no armed conflict in Burkina Faso. Unofficial translation. Governmental Armed Forces 2. There is no legal provision for conscription in Burundi. Prior to the conflict the minimum age for voluntary recruitment was believed to have been 18 years.
In its initial report to the Committee on the Rights of the Child, Burundi stated that the minimum age of recruitment is fixed between 16 and 25 years of age, but that, in practice, nobody is enrolled below the age of One source suggested that the minimum age for recruitment was actually 15 years.
It is asserted that before the beginning of the conflict in Burundi no children under 18 years of age were recruited into the armed forces but it is widely agreed, despite Government denials, that this did occur in substantial numbers, once fighting broke out. According to the report, they are seen close to combatants and are used to collect and provide them with information.
In fact, these children, who serve as kind of housekeepers, are completely integrated into the military environment. They wear military uniforms, they sleep in the same rooms as the soldiers, and they are taught to use weapons. Most do not go to school, though there are exceptions.
He was wearing a uniform and was a war orphan. Apparently only ethnic Tutsis are accepted in the army. The UN Special Rapporteur on Burundi, for example, has specifically asked the Burundian authorities "not to recruit young people under 18 years of age for the army or mandatory civic service and to ensure that such recruitment is never imposed by force and that it includes all the ethnic components of the population without distinction.
Estimates of the numbers of children recruited by the armed forces over the past five years vary considerably, from a low of 2, to a high of 14, This has appreciably reduced the hold of extremist groups over young people and is a positive step. In addition to regular armed forces, Tutsi armed groups, made up of youths aged from 12 to 25, were formed with the encouragement of Government authorities with the aim of defending the Tutsi minority.
But these groups disappeared with the arrival of Major Pierre Buyoya at the head of the country. The eldest of these youths have tended to be enlisted into the regular armed forces, whereas the younger ones have carried out military tasks. It is difficult to obtain accurate information on the situation in these schools but the minimum age for entry is believed to be between 13 and In this case, the minimum age is believed to be between 17 and 20 years.
Pikou is one the army recruits who took part in the fighting in Burundi following the coup attempt:. We had been conscripted in the army, given the need to expand troops to fight rebels. Twenty days were enough before we were given uniforms, boots and everything. Pikou, a Tutsi, is now living in Nairobi trying to put his military experiences behind him.
I just deserted the army to embrace new horizons. In fact, my ambition was not to become a soldier, but to be a businessman. Testimony received by Gervais Abayeho.
An internal armed conflict has been opposing the Tutsi-dominated security forces and allied armed groups to an armed Hutu-dominated opposition group for the last five years. The conflict has so far claimed more than , lives and triggered massive population displacement both within the country and across into neighbouring countries.
Since July , when Major Pierre Buyoya seized power in a military coup, the country has been largely cut off from the outside world, following the decision by nine countries from the region to impose harsh economic sanctions. These sanctions were suspended in January , on condition that the peace process continues. The peace process started in June under the mediation of the former Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere and the same month a new provisional constitution was adopted by the Burundian parliament as a gesture of goodwill towards the process.
By the end of three rounds of negotiations had taken place but it was predicted that three more would be needed to produce a workable peace accord. It has been estimated that between 8, and 10, children are currently taking part in hostilities in Burundi. According to several reports, children as young as years of age have been seen at checkpoints in the countryside, but rarely in Bujumbura. Burundians try to justify this by claiming that children look younger than they really are because of malnutrition.
Their total fighting strength is not known. No opposition armed group has, so far, pledged not to recruit children into its ranks, and according to the army the Hutu groups are increasingly being made up of child soldiers, including both boys and girls under 15 years of age.
At the beginning of the conflict, it is estimated that between 3, and 5, children below the age of 18 had been sent to the Central African Republic, Rwanda and Tanzania for training. Between 1, and 1, children of both sexes were recruited. Boys became spies and were sent to the camps of the regular forces and girls were used as wives and cooks. As a result, one source claims that there are fewer and fewer children in these groups between and This reduction in number is also partly due to the fact that families who agreed at the beginning of the war to give their children to these groups refused to continue this.
Consequently, these families are the target of punitive attacks. Moreover, the Hutu groups are backed by the former Rwandan and Zairian armed forces and by Uganda and Angola. At that time he was barely 12 years old. They [the army] had killed our President, we had to fight back. I dropped [out of] school. School was almost impossible for us, as Kamenge was almost daily rocked with heavy shelling by the army and the rebels.
Most of them had already fled, knowing very well that Kamenge was no longer their place. Those who remained were slaughtered. We used to live together, but what the Army had done was unacceptable". A Tutsi could not venture into a Hutu area and vice versa, while assassinations and murders downtown were common place. When the rebellion in Kamenge was overpowered by the Army in , Silvester managed to sneak out of the area with his family and together they crossed into Kenya to seek asylum.
Now living in Nairobi, he has resumed school. His memory, however, is still haunted by what he saw and did in Kamenge as a child rebel. But sometimes we did enjoy it, you know during fire exchange with the military. I lost my dad and my two brothers in the fight and told myself that I had no other choice but doing it. According to another source there are no clear rules on recruitment into the armed forces.
Information supplied by a reliable source requesting confidentiality. DCI-Burundi, op. Information supplied by Gervais Abayeho.
ACEDH, op. The UN Special Rapporteur on Burundi has stated that "the rebels have not only destroyed numerous schools, particularly in Bujumbura Rural, but also kidnapped school-age children and adolescents to force them to join their ranks. Amnesty International, op. Presidential Decree No. The minimum age for recruitment is 18 years. There is no evidence of any underage recruitment into the armed forces.
There is no ongoing armed conflict involving Cameroon, although a border dispute exists between Cameroon and Nigeria over the Bakassi peninsula, where there have been sporadic skirmishes, and over Lake Chad. On 28 October , Nigeria filed a request for an interpretation of this judgement the first time this has occurred in the history of the ICJ. For the time being, the case remains pending.
Article In a press communique dated 12 May from the Minister Delegate at the Presidency in charge of Defence, there is a minimum age of 18 years for direct recruitment into the school. Ejime, P. Casteran, C. Military conscription exists and is compulsory. Article 83 1 of the constitution states that "[a]ll individuals shall have the duty to contribute to the defence of the nation.
Military service is selective and lasts for two years,3 but no information is available on the methods of recruitment and selection. There is no armed conflict in Cape Verde. Central African Republic. No information is currently available on national legislation governing recruitment. Conscription is selective and military service lasts for 2 years. In , the Central African Republic was shaken by a politico-military crisis, punctuated by three successive mutinies by elements of the Armed Forces.
As a result of the mediation of Presidents of Gabon, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali, the Bangui Agreements were signed on 25 January by the different parties, which included the necessary elements for a comprehensive settlement of the crisis. On 31 January , an Inter-African Mission to Monitor the Implementation of the Bangui Agreements MISAB was set up with the mandate to restore peace and security in the country, notably by undertaking operations to disarm the former rebels, the militia and all other unlawfully armed individuals.
Certain elements of the Bangui Agreements have not yet been implemented, for example the restructuring of the armed forces. There is no evidence of any child participation in the conflict.
Military service is compulsory according to Article 51 2 of the Constitution. This article also states that "[T]he defence of the Fatherland and the integrity of the national territory is a duty for every Chadian" , and that "[T]he conditions for accomplishing this duty are determined by law.
However, a law adopted the following year states that although volunteers must be 18 years of age, a non-emancipated minor can be enrolled with the consent of his tutor. Moreover, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation indicated that there is no minimum age for the participation in an armed conflict. It has been reported that conscription is applied selectively to some groups.
The Chadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation mentioned that the conscripts are divided into two groups. The first one the size of which is fixed by decree every year is effectively enrolled into the armed forces, while the second group stays at the disposal of the military authorities for a period of two years.
He added that these children frequently denounced people who were not members of the opposition groups. The authorities have admitted this unlawful recruitment. The terms and conditions set by the Sovereign National Conference forbids the recruitment of children in the regular armed forces and calls for the rehabilitation of children who have served as soldiers. In , a national workshop was organised on the issue during which military, religious and political leaders expressed their opposition to the use of child soldiers.
Structures were subsequently created within the Ministry of Defence to tackle the problem. Furthermore, a mediation body was created within the office of the Prime Minister which approached the rebels to advocate against the use of child soldiers. Thanks to this, the use of child soldiers was considerably reduced by both the rebels and the regular armed forces.
A memorandum of understanding signed between the Republic of Chad and France on 30 July provided for a reduction in the size of the armed forces, the discharge of minors and their reintegration into civilian life.
A decree concerning the discharge of army personnel stipulates that the provisions apply specifically to minors. Of the minors listed, were discharged with an end-of-service grant. The other 33, having reached the age of majority, preferred to continue their army career. After three decades of civil war which has been internationalised because of the intervention of several foreign powers mostly France and Libya, and more sporadically Israel, Nigeria, Sudan, and USA Idriss Deby seized power in He was not able to establish democracy, however, and from the Chadian National Army ANT was once more confronted by a number of armed opposition groups, mainly in the South and the East of the country.
In May a second peace accord between the Government and the FARF officially ended the armed conflit in the south of the country. As with the previous accord, it provided for an amnesty for all members of the FARF and for the integration of its members into the army.
In late , Chad sent troops to the Democratic Republic of Congo in order to help President Kabila in his fight against the rebels. In , the main armed opposition groups created the National Alliance for the Resistance ANR , which follows many other agreements among armed groups. About 1, men. According to reliable sources, the size of the army is about 52, men but is being reduced to 26, under the structural adjustment programme.
Article 52 of Ordinance No. Information provided by reliable sources. Article 2 of Decree No. The procedure for recruitment is governed by legislation, although it has not been possible to obtain a copy. There is a military training centre on the main island of the Comoros, but again the minimum age of recruitment is During the time of the mercenaries,4 young boys were recruited by the Government but this has been stopped since It is hard to determine which current members of the armed forces were actually recruited under the age of In August , after four months fighting between federal troops and separatists of the Island of Anjouan, the separatists declared the independence of Anjouan from the rest of the Comoros.
In December , renewed fighting broke out on the island between different separatist groups, and the Federal Government requested military intervention from the Organization of African Unity OAU to help restore peace and security.
After an emergency meeting of the OAU, it was decided to respond to the request as a matter of urgency. A regional delegation of diplomats led by South Africa arrived in the Comoros on 9 December There are now two separatists groups in Anjouan. Both agree on the need for independence of the island but disagree on what its relationship with France should be. Neither group has made a public declaration not to recruit children.
It is hard to know how many each group numbers but UNICEF has received information that in both groups young boys between 13 and 16 years of age have been recruited. It is believed that alcohol or drugs are used to entice children into joining the groups. Brett, R. The period between and where mercenaries backed by South Africa , among them Bob Denard, were particularly close to the Government.
After the coup, the mercenaries left the country. There has been no conscription since and, apparently, enlistment in the armed forces is voluntary. The minimum age for recruitment is It is not known whether recruitment procedures for enlistment into the regular armed forces are followed. It is certain that recruitment of children into government-supported militia has been systematic.
An internal armed conflict broke out in June when Cocoye troops loyal to democratically-elected President Lissouba encircled the Brazzaville residence of opposition leader Sassou Nguesso. However the arrival of Angolan troops to support Sassou proved decisive and he won the war in October forcing Lissouba and his Prime Minister Bernard Kolelas into exile. Each political party created a militia in just after the contested parliamentary elections.
Reports estimate that between 7, and 10, people were members of government-sponsored or opposition militia groups during the June-October conflict. They recruited people from the towns who were between 15 and 35 years of age. In June , Rodolphe Adada, the Congolese Foreign Minister, said in a press conference that the problem of child soldiers was truly a tragedy, and one that was unfortunately seen all too often. He added, though, that in the case of Congo, it was not extremely significant.
According to him, although the problem certainly needed to be addressed, child participation had not been a major issue, except towards the end of civil war, when more young children under the age of 16 had taken part in the fighting.
But a new cycle of hostilities started in southern Brazzaville during the autumn of between the armed forces of the new government and the Ninjas , the militia of the former Prime Minister Bernard Kolelas. In December , seeking to end the civil war once and for all, President Sassou deployed regular army troops in the region of Pool, south of the capital. This led to an increase in the level of fighting and continuing excesses.
The US State Department reported, in its Human Rights Report on Congo-Brazzaville that undisciplined Government soldiers including Cobra militia forces, were responsible for summary executions and rape in response to anti-government violence during the last four months of As rebel militia came into the capital, witnesses reported seeing many children among them.
The crowd was welcoming them. I sensed the danger and went home. On 26 January , the Minister of Defence ordered military mobilisation in the south of the country because of the fighting opposing the governmental forces to the Cocoye and the Ninjas. We will not negotiate with people who have destroyed the country and have knives in their teeth. On the reports of indiscipline and human rights abuses among his soldiers, he said a "mind set we are attempting to alter has set [ in ] in this country".
Goodwin-Gill, G. Fall, J. Bazenguissa-Ganga, R. Africa Confidential , 24 October ; Newsweek , 20 October Congo, Democratic Republic. There are no precise figures of the size of the armed forces in the Democratic Republic of Congo DRC because of the change of regime. The South African Press Agency of Agence France Presse estimated that the DRC forces number around 60, ground troops, plus another 15, young recruits currently receiving training. Kinshasa also has special police units, and the backing of 15, Mayi-Mayi in the eastern provinces of North and South Kivu.
The draft DRC Constitution enshrines a provision concerning the minimum age of recruitment, which is set at 18 years. This is in accordance with what the government claims is currently the practice, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This led many young people from Kisangani, for example, to leave the city in order to avoid being forcibly recruited.
According to one commentator, "if they refused to join the armed group, they were usually arrested, accused of connivance with the enemy and, frequently, summarily executed.
After the arrival in power of President Kabila, the DRC army became a mish-mash of different types of personnel, including former Zairean armed forces, new recruits a lot of children among them , and Rwandan soldiers. In Kinsangani, up to 4, former child soldiers were gathered in the Kapalata camp where they were malnourished and living in deplorable conditions.
Several hundred died of cholera or malnutrition in December A pilot training centre was set up in March in Kaniama-Kasese. Most of them were street children who were told that they would be sent to the Kibomango camp for military training. She said that UNICEF was especially concerned about the re-enlistment of some children from a transit centre near the city of Kisangani and more than from the eastern town of Bukavu.
A spokesman for UNICEF gave further clarification, saying that these youngsters had been abducted by the rebels but that both sides were involved in enlisting young teenagers. A FAC Government armed forces commander in Kinshasa who had done an informal survey of troops stationed there in November found that one out of every fourteen FAC soldiers was under the age of thirteen. In March , a year-old Congo boy soldier who shot and killed a local Red Cross volunteer in Kinshasa after a dispute on a football pitch was condemned to death by a military tribunal.
Military officers in the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo went beyond prosecution recommendations for life imprisonment and imposed a capital sentence.
The prosecution said that the lack of control of boy soldiers with guns was as much the fault of their older commanders and constitued extenuating circumstances.
Following appeals from various sources, the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by President Kabila. Estimates of the number of child soldiers in the army range from 6, to 20, Reuters report from 28 March and 21 April The Democratic Republic of Congo said Aid workers say up to 3, young Mayi-Mayi, some as young as eight years old, were living in the Kapalata barracks in cramped and miserable conditions without adequate food and water.
The majority of the Mayi-Mayi children at the camp handed themselves over to authorities last October as potential recruits for the national army after several months of low-level fighting in the eastern Kivu provinces. William Wallis, Reuters, 29 January I n August a conflict broke out between Tutsi-led rebels and Government forces in the far East of the country. Initially, southern African countries were split over how to handle the war.
But the crisis in the DRC took a definitive turn with the decisive military support lent by Zimbabwe and Angola to President Kabila against the rebellion, which was itself backed by Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda. Furthermore the report states that it remains unclear whether small arms produced in Germany - one of the biggest global arms exporters - could end up in child soldiers' hands worldwide. Red Hand Day recalls the trauma of child soldiers and the help they need readjusting to civilian life.
A recent ICC ruling granted compensation for war crimes victims, from which ex-child soldiers can benefit. The UN agency says the recent conflict is to blame. Visit the new DW website Take a look at the beta version of dw. Go to the new dw. More info OK. Wrong language? Change it here DW. COM has chosen English as your language setting. COM in 30 languages. Deutsche Welle. Audiotrainer Deutschtrainer Die Bienenretter. Globalization Forced to fight, children suffer all their lives Child soldiers are both victims and victimizers.
Victimizing the vulnerable The United Nations UN estimate some , children are deployed by armies or armed rebel groups in military conflicts - in almost all conflict areas worldwide. How children have become frontline targets in armed conflicts. From a child in war to renowned author, human rights activist and Goodwill Ambassador. Critical support for former child soldiers in South Sudan at risk from lack of funding.
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Chad and the Democratic Republic of the Congo put in place all necessary measures to end and prevent the recruitment of children in their armed forces and are no longer listed.
Child Recruitment and Use. Child Recruitment and Use Stephanie Tremblay T The recruitment and use of children is a trigger to list parties to armed conflict in the annexes of the annual report of the Secretary-General on children and armed conflict.
Tens of thousands of children are recruited and used as soldiers in armed conflicts around the world. Combat and support roles In many conflicts children take direct part in combat. Definition of a child soldier A child associated with an armed force or armed group refers to any person below 18 years of age who is, or who has been, recruited or used by an armed force or armed group in any capacity, including but not limited to children, boys and girls, used as fighters, cooks, porters, spies or for sexual purposes.
Source: Paris Principles on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict A long healing process Regardless of how children are recruited and of their roles, child soldiers are victims, whose participation in conflict bears serious implications for their physical and emotional well-being. Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict In , the UN General Assembly adopted the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict to protect children from recruitment and use in hostilities.
The Optional protocol is a commitment that: States will not recruit children under the age of 18 to send them to the battlefield.
States will not conscript soldiers below the age of States should take all possible measures to prevent such recruitment —including legislation to prohibit and criminalize the recruitment of children under 18 and involve them in hostilities.
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