Where are the Girls? - New international study on Child Soldiers

A groundbreaking Canadian study elaborating and challenging the conventionally held view of girls in war is today, Thursday, being launched in Montreal by Rights & Democracy and the United Nations. Based on over three years research, with special focus on the use of girls in conflicts in Mozambique, Uganda and Sierra Leone, the authors, Susan McKay and Dyan Mazurana, suggest that girls are not just victims of violence and abuse but also perpetrators. Their research gives insight into why young women and girls may actively choose to participate in conflict and carry out acts of violence, as well as how they can be coerced into taking up military roles through propaganda, abduction, intimidation and forcible recruitment. Apart from detailing the various ways girls are involved in conflicts, the authors also reveal how governments obfuscate the use of girls in their own militaries, while at the same time drawing attention to their presence in opposition forces. The resultant concealment and denial of information concerning girls and their involvement in conflict means they are frequently not fully assisted or addressed during peace-building and post-conflict reconstruction. The report, funded by the Canadian International Development Agency, questions how such girls will be assisted in reintegration. It also recommends a broadened understanding by the internationally community of the actual roles performed by girl soldiers. The London-based Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers told IRIN that irrespective of whether those roles were active or passive, the idea of voluntary recruitment of girls was "dubious", because it was neutralised by the girls' status as minors. Leading experts on child soldiers have already praised the Rights & Democracy report as an important contribution to guiding policy makers and programme implementers towards a fuller understanding of the issues involved and the scope for intervention. This latest study reinforces what the Coalition said in its "Child Soldier Use in 2003" that "children were usually used to perform multiple roles, and girls in particular often acted as combatants, as well as being sexually exploited". It also noted that "... girls continue to be overlooked and excluded from such [demobilisation] programmes". A representative of the Coalition told IRIN that the new study was a "huge contribution to the debate on girl child soldiers, with important sections on girl mothers, who become mothers as a result of rape and abuse and suffer massive stigmatisation on return to their communities". The Coalition and Rights & Democracy are part of a worldwide movement which over recent years has shaped the progress made in developing a legal and policy framework for protecting children involved in armed conflict. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, on children in armed conflict, which came into force in February 2002, prohibits the direct use of any child under the age of 18 in armed conflict and prohibits all use of under-18s by non-state armed groups "under any circumstances". By mid-December 2003, 67 states had ratified the protocol. Another landmark development was the adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which classifies conscription, enlistment or use in hostilities of children below 15 years of age as a war crime in both international and internal armed conflicts. The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (1999) establishes 18 as the minimum age for all compulsory military recruitment and participation in hostilities. Nevertheless, the "Child Soldier Use report for 2003", released in January 2004, and charting the use of children in conflict in 17 countries, states that "remarkably little progress has been made in ending the use of child soldiers, and some violators have even increased their recruitment of children". (The Rights & Democracy website can be found on www.ichrdd.ca while the Coalition’s website is www.child-soldiers.org)