World Day Against Child Soldiers Shameful Crime In 18 Countries

Michele Raviart - Vatican City The story of the "many children taken from their families and from schools to be used as soldiers" is "a tragedy" pope francis recalled this at the Angelus on February 19, 2017, speaking of the violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Francis then often returned to talk about this "abominable crime", the last time in the press conference with journalists returning precisely from the African country - where this phenomenon is particularly widespread - visited together with South Sudan last week "Kids are recruited to join the militia and fight with other kids," he said, recalling how this is a diabolical effect of the sale of arms, which destroy the person, society and creation.

[ Read Also ] The UN: an unbearable violence The United Nations condemns this phenomenon, which involves at least 18 countries in the world and has instituted an international day for each February 12 to remember this abomination "Children around the world continue to be disproportionately affected by armed conflicts" reads a joint UN-European Union statement released on the occasion of the day, "and are forced to suffer unbearable levels of violence, are deprived of their childhood and the right to education and are left with deep physical and psychological scars that last a lifetime”.

Over six thousand minors enlisted in 2021 According to the latest available UN data, there are at least six thousand minors enlisted and used in wars around the world, some of whom are only six years old One of the countries most involved is Somalia, where 1,200 children have been kidnapped and used by al-shabab militiamen and in some cases also by the army and police.

Among other States: Afghanistan, Colombia, Central African Republic, Iraq, Mali, Nigeria, Sudan, Syria and Yemen Precisely in the state of the Arabian peninsula, which has been at war for years, there are two thousand minors between the ages of 10 and 17 recruited by the Houti rebels and who died in combat between January 2020 and May 2021.

Eight thousand worldwide, with about 3,500 kidnappings and 1,300 cases of sexual violence [ Read Also ] Recruitment in villages and refugee camps "Recruitment usually takes place in two main ways", explains Maurizio Simoncelli, vice president of Archivio Disarmo, which has carried out numerous studies on the subject.

“On the one hand-he explains-c ' it is the direct kidnapping in villages and schools by the militias, in the majority of cases it concerns irregular armed forces but there are episodes also in regular ones, on the other we go to refugee camps, where children are often isolated, without points of reference, without a family and sometimes the idea of ​​joining an armed group can give a new sense of protection, even if these children are then used for extremely dangerous tasks and the girls are also used as sexual slaves” [ Audio Embed Listen to the complete interview with Maurizio Simoncelli] The drama of reintegration What the international community can do, underlines Simoncelli, "is to support the commitment of the United Nations, which has been trying for years to recover these child soldiers by involving the armed to release them.

The good news is that, in 2021, 12,200 children were released, even if there remains a problem on which unfortunately much remains to be done, which is that of reintegration" "Psychologically - she concludes - it is not easy to reintegrate children who have spent half their lives fighting and killing".

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