Thread: Child Soldiers

Contrary to what is preached, United States resumes military aid to 4 nations that heavily use child soldiers
Daya Gamage
Sun, 2010-10-31



Despite the fact that the United States on official State Department and Congressional documents declare the existence and heavily use of child soldiers in four African nations, the Obama administration is allowing American military aid to continue to those countries, issuing a waiver this week of a 2008 law, the Child Soldiers Prevention Act sponsored and championed by his own vice president Joe Biden when he was the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In a memorandum to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday, 25 October President Obama said he had determined that the waiver was in “the national interest.” The White House memo also makes the justification that the U.S. is fighting a terrorist war in the region.

Blatantly ignoring the Congressional Act enacted in 2008 when he was in the Senate, and voting for it, and clearly exhibiting to the rest of the world that the United States’ declared position against the recruitment of child soldiers in combat zones as empty rhetoric, the Obama White House has put Hilary Clinton’s State Department in a embarrassing position in the eyes of the diplomatic world.

It was Clinton’s State Department that gave ‘notice’ to Sri Lanka to use its authority to get the LTTE-breakaway group Karuna Faction to release the child soldiers serving that Para-military group which fought alongside its military forces combating Tamil Tiger separatists.

The four countries that are heavily using underage child soldiers but Obama administration chose “in the national interest” to resume/continue military assistance are Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Yemen.

Of the six countries the State Department identified as using child soldiers during 2009, only two — Somalia and Myanmar — were not granted exemptions from the law, and Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) receives no military aid from the United States.

The Child Soldier Prevention Act generally prohibits American military financing, training and other defense assistance to countries found to recruit soldiers under the age of 18.

The United States alleged that Sri Lanka Para-military group – TMVP or Karuna Group - which worked with that nation’s military in combating separatist Tamil Tigers recruited and used child soldiers under Sri Lanka government watch, and was used as one reason to reduce or cut military assistance in its anti-terrorism operation in 2007 through 2009.

On April 19, 2007, U.S. Senators Durbin (D-IL) and Brownback (R-KS) introduced the Child Soldier Prevention Act of 2007 (S. 1175). This bill restricts U.S. military assistance to governments that are implicated in supporting the recruitment or use of children in government armed forces or government-allied armed groups as a means to help end this practice. S. 1175 also urges the United States to expand its efforts to help remove and rehabilitate children from armed forces and groups around the world and work with the international community to bring to justice armed oppositional groups that have kidnapped children for use as soldiers.

Following are the two vital sections of the Child Soldiers Prevention and Accountability Act of 2008 -

Section 403 - Prohibits, with a national interest waiver, funds for specified military and related areas from being made available to the government of a country identified by the Secretary as having governmental armed forces or government supported armed groups that recruit or use child soldiers. Authorizes the President to reinstate such assistance upon certifying to Congress that a government is implementing:

(1) compliance measures; and

(2) mechanisms to prohibit future use of child soldiers. Authorizes the President to provide assistance to a country for international military education and training otherwise prohibited under this Act upon certifying to Congress that such assistance is for measures to demobilize child soldiers and for programs to professionalize the military.

Section 404 - Requires that U.S. missions abroad investigate reports on child soldiers. Directs the Secretary to include in the annual country reports on human rights practices a description of the use of child soldiers.

Child Soldiers in 4 Countries

In Chad, the U.S. is engaged in counterterrorism activities but also is working with the government's armed forces to deal with the spillover of refugees from the crisis over the Sudanese border in Darfur.

In the DRC, the U.S. is providing training of various types, military advisors, and also military vehicles and spare parts to the Congolese army. Over 33,000 child soldiers have been involved in the decade old civil war there and the country leads the world in the use of underage troops, according to UNICEF.

With regard to Sudan, other sanctions prevent the United States from helping the Khartoum government in the North, but the U.S. is giving military training assistance to the Southern People's Liberation Army, which could end up a national army if the South votes to separate in the January referendum. The SPLA has about 1,200 child soldiers, the official said, adding that cutting off such training would only undermine ongoing reform efforts.

Yemen is a recipient of significant direct U.S. military assistance, having received $155 million in fiscal 2010 with a possible $1.2 billion coming over the next five years. Yemen is also a much needed ally for counterterrorism operations. The government is engaged in a bloody fight with al Qaeda (among other separatist and terrorist groups), and estimates put the ratio of child soldiers among all the groups there at more than half.



Obama justification

In a memorandum to the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday, the Obama White House made many justifications for providing military assistance to the four nations. The headline was “In the national interest”.

But another justification is that the US administration will work with these four nations to eliminate the child soldier problem.

For each exempted country, the White House memo states that the US government "is working ... to reduce and eliminate" the use of child soldiers. The document makes the argument that cutting off funding to the affected governments' militaries will make it harder to ultimately turn them away from recruiting youths.

In the case of Chad, the memo says that applying the 2008 law "would hinder the United States government's effort to reinforce positive trends," such as an effort to work with the United Nations to demobilize children in the army.

The memo also cites Chad's counterterrorism role. It says Chad "plays a critical role" hosting some 280,000 Sudanese refugees and is a US "partner" in the Trans-Sahara Counter Terrorism Partnership and "strongly supports" counterterrorism objectives.

In Sudan, where citizens will vote on possible secession between north and south in 2011, the US government funds military education for the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) - the southern Sudanese armed forces - and prohibiting funding would "preclude the ability to deliver critical training necessary to professionalize the SPLA".

As of December, the memo addressed to Secretary of State says, the SPLA included around 1,200 children - both boys and girls aged between 12 and 17 years old.

"Some of these children serve as combatants, and others, including those under 15 years old, serve a variety of functions, including as guards, porters, and cooks," the memo states.

The decision by Obama to waive penalties for the four countries has exposed him to criticism from human rights groups and even from his rival party the Republicans.

asiantribune.com

see also : https://teakdoor.com/thailand-and-asi...d-soldier.html

and

https://teakdoor.com/thailand-and-asi...tml#post441121 (Aung San Suu Kyi appears at protest in Burma)

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Originally Posted by Mid

the waiver was in “the national interest.”

fok that , who is looking to the interests of the children

Obama youth squad coming soon!

Child Soldiers

"I would like you to give a message. Please do your best to tell the world what is happening to us, the children. So that other children don't have to pass through this violence."

The 15-year-old girl who ended an interview to Amnesty International with this plea was forcibly abducted at night from her home by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), an armed opposition movement fighting the Ugandan Government.

She was made to kill a boy who tried to escape.

She saw another boy being hacked to death for not raising the alarm when a friend ran away.

She was beaten when she dropped a water container and ran for cover under gunfire.

She received 35 days of military training and was sent to fight the government army.

The use of children as soldiers has been universally condemned as abhorrent and unacceptable.

Yet over the last ten years hundreds of thousands of children have fought and died in conflicts around the world.

Children involved in armed conflict are frequently killed or injured during combat or while carrying out other tasks.

They are forced to engage in hazardous activities such as laying mines or explosives, as well as using weapons.

Child soldiers are usually forced to live under harsh conditions with insufficient food and little or no access to healthcare.

They are almost always treated brutally, subjected to beatings and humiliating treatment.

Punishments for mistakes or desertion are often very severe.

Girl soldiers are particularly at risk of rape, sexual harassment and abuse as well as being involved in combat and other tasks.

child-soldiers.org


Get involved : Get involved [Coalition to stop the use of Child Soldiers]

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children are brutalised in many ways in many countries.
seeing a kid with a AK47 or whatever shows how we have developed as humans in the last 20,000 or 1 million years.
how pathetic we are.
and we 'think' we are smart and intelligent.
and i hear you all saying ,,,yea but in so an so time ,,it will all be ok.
we've only got good at fooling ourselves.