By Erica Smith
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa
KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of the Congo — The United Nations peacekeeping mission for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), or MONUSCO, issued a report Thursday detailing the continuing recruitment of child soldiers in the DRC.
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According to the report 1,000 cases of child recruitment were verified by MONUSCO between January 2012 and August 2013, predominantly in the conflict prone eastern province of North Kivu. The armed groups Nyatura, Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda (FDLR) and the 23 March Movement (M23) were identified as having recruited 451 children total during the reporting period. Children formerly associated with M23 describe how they were forced to dig graves for other children and adults killed in fighting with the DRC army.
In most of cases, children were abducted and forced to join the groups. Other children joined voluntarily after having been promised money, education, and jobs by recruiters. Children were used as porters, cooks, spies, sex slaves, guards and combatants. The children are also reported to have been victims and witnesses to other children’s rights violations, such as rape, abduction, killing and maiming.
“Despite awareness raising campaigns and attempts to pacify armed groups, recruitment of children remains endemic in the country, with high numbers of children recruited in the past two years as a result of renewed hostilities in the east of the country,” the report states.
“This situation is unacceptable and has been going on for much too long with impunity. Recruiting children into armed groups is a crime, and destroys the lives of the victims who are forced to do things that no child should be involved in…We need to stop this now. One case of child recruitment is one case to many,”said Martin Kobler, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for DRC and head of MONUSCO.
MONUSCO has called on all armed groups and their commanders in the DRC to halt recruiting children and to unconditionally release all children currently in their custody.
The mission recommended that the Government, the international community, donors and all child protection advocates ensure that all efforts are made to prevent child recruitment and to ensure long-term, sustainable reintegration programs for victims of child solider recruitment.
For more information, please see:
UPI — U.N. envoy says child-soldier recruitment in Congo ‘unacceptable’ — 25 October 2013
United Nations News Centre — Child recruitment remains ‘endemic’ in DR Congo, UN says in new report — 24 October 2013
UPI — Rwanda denies backing child soldiers in DRC — 7 October 2013
Reuters — U.S. sanctions Rwanda, others over child soldiers — 3 October 2013