The Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Syria and Yemen currently have the largest number of child soldiers. 3. Children are not only recruited by armed forces and groups as fighters. They are also used as informants, looters, messengers, spies and as domestic or sexual slaves.
There are an estimated 250,000 child soldiers in the world today in at least 20 countries. About 40% of child soldiers are girls, who are often used as sex slaves and taken as “wives” by male fighters.
The majority of child soldiers are forcibly recruited either through abduction, conscription, coercion, or by being born into an armed group. However, there are still child soldiers that join armed groups of their own volition.
The use of child soldiers in Iraq is pervasive, with the practice going as far back as 1975, manifested in Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath party initiative that strove to create a paramilitary organization for children as young as 14 years of age.
The Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Syria and Yemen currently have the largest number of child soldiers. 3. Children are not only recruited by armed forces and groups as fighters. They are also used as informants, looters, messengers, spies and as domestic or sexual slaves.
The Turkish government has worked to identify trafficking victims, including child soldiers. In 2020, the government identified 349 trafficking victims (an increase compared to 2019 and 2020), including 14 child soldiers.
Thousands of children stay within the Taliban's ranks serving in dangerous combative roles. With the U.N. and NGOs calling for urgent humanitarian aid, hope remains for a decrease in the number of children becoming child soldiers in Afghanistan.
The TFG is listed by the United Nations (UN) as one of the greatest offenders in recruiting children into their armed forces. The militant rebel group al-Shabaab who are fighting to establish an Islamic state is another major recruiter of children.
The United States remains one of the few nations which recruits and enlists minors into the military. Popular U.S. culture thinks of child soldiers as fighting in Africa.
Human rights law declares 18 as the minimum legal age for recruitment and use of children in hostilities. Recruiting and using children under the age of 15 as soldiers is prohibited under international humanitarian law – treaty and custom – and is defined as a war crime by the International Criminal Court.
NEW YORK, June 21 (Reuters) - More than 8,500 children were used as soldiers last year in various conflicts across the world and nearly 2,700 others were killed, the United Nations said on Monday.
In recent years, the use of child soldiers by both government forces and insurgent groups in African countries such as Angola, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sierra Leone, and Sudan has been harshly condemned by the international community.
At what age can you join the military? Recruits must be 18 (or 17 with parental consent). The maximum age to join most services is 35. However, the Air Force allows entry up to 39 years of age, but the Navy only 34.
It is a commonly held belief that the majority of child soldiers are children who have been abducted or violently forced into armed conflict. While this can be true, it is more often circumstantial factors that leave a child with no choice but to join a militarized faction.
Somalia possesses the largest number of children who have died during war in the world. Somalia's ongoing civil war led to drastic measures, including child recruitment into armed forces. In 2017, Somalia recorded 931 children killed at war, along with 2,127 children used in conflict.
Ultimately hundreds of thousands were saved from starvation, but unintended involvement in Somali civil strife cost the lives of thirty American soldiers, four marines, and eight Air Force personnel and created the impression of chaos and disaster.
South Sudanese government forces use children to fight and perpetuate violence against other children and civilians, serve as bodyguards, staff checkpoints, and in other security support roles.
Children in Somalia are recruited and used, killed or maimed, abducted, and subjected to rape and other forms of sexual violence at staggering levels, making Somalia one of the direst situations on the children and armed conflict agenda.
The child soldiers in Syria become spies, combatants and checkpoint guards, among other roles, enduring sexual exploitation and harsh military punishments. By using children as combatants, these groups continue to violate international laws with few repercussions.
The Taliban used children to carry out suicide and other dangerous attacks, often recruiting them through deception, with promises of money or other incentives, and threats.
The majority of children are used by militants, though government supported self-defence militias also use them. The Asian Legal Resource Centre has stated that human rights groups have voiced concerns over the use of child soldiers by the state and the Naxalites.
Child Soldiers
During World War II, child insurgents between the ages of 11 and 18 served as full-fledged members of the Polish Home Army.
How widespread is the use of child soldiers? Approximately 300,000 children are believed to be combatants in some thirty conflicts worldwide. Nearly half a million additional children serve in armies not currently at war, such that 40 percent of the world's armed organizations have children in their ranks.
Corporal punishment is lawful in the home. In 2002, the Civil Code was amended to remove parents' “right of correction”, but the Criminal Code 2004 recognises the concept of “disciplinary power” (art. 232). It appears court cases relating to assault have been dismissed on the basis of this “disciplinary power”.