Did you know that countries in Africa, Asia, and South America all share a common crisis: child soldiers. According to a UNICEF report issued in 2001,
A child soldier is defined as any child - boy or girl - under
18 years of age, who is part of any kind of regular or irregular
armed force or armed group in any capacity, including, but
not limited to: cooks, porters, messengers, and anyone
accompanying such groups other than family members. It includes
girls and boys recruited for sexual purposes and/or forced marriage.
The definition, therefore, does not only refer to a child who is
carrying, or has carried weapons.
According to a report issued by the World Bank in May 2002, over 300,000 children were involved in armed conflicts worldwide (Verhey 1). Africa is one region greatly impacted by this crisis. Often genocide is the end result.
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Worldwide Distribution of Child Soldiers
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2 comments:
This is thought-provoking post. I had no idea that the definition of child soldier was so broad and encompassing as to include unarmed combatants. I have two questions you may want to consider:
1) Is this primarily an African phenomenon? I'm wondering if there are cases of this in certain parts of Latin America or Asia, or even in Iraq. My impression is that the situation in Africa is the most widely publicized.
2) Contemporary cases of child soldiers seem much more grim than the almost patriotic depictions of drummer boys we've come to associate with our own Revolutionary and Civil wars. To what extent does our own history of child soldiers affect our attitudes about it today?
Looking forward to reading more.
This is a real good project, Jeremy.
There are cases of child soldiers all over the world, not just in Africa. For example, see the article on "Military Use of Children" in Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_Soldiers
So you might want to post some links pointing to more information.
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