Part 3 of 5
Cycles of Violence
Modern warfare ignores the traditional rules of the battlefield. Today, more than 90% of all war casualties are civilian, and children are increasingly not only victims of the violence but direct actors in it.1 As recently as 2001, it was estimated that 300,000 children were participating in armed conflicts around the world, and thousands more were facing recruitment or serving in armed forces not engaged in conflicts.2 The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict bans the involvement and recruitment of children under 18 in armed conflict.3 Despite 110 countries signing onto the Optional Protocol, both state and non-state actors continue to actively recruit and use children under 18 in both formal and non-formal militias. Currently, 20 countries are known to have children fighting in their conflicts; 10 of these have state militias implicated in the use of child soldiers. The United States provides 9 of these states with military assistance, one of which is Colombia.
Colombia has been in the throes of an internal conflict for 40 years. An estimated 1.4 million of the country's 43.3 people are internally displaced within Colombia itself, while hundreds of thousands more have fled to neighboring countries.4 The vast majority of children engaged in Colombia's conflict serve in two guerrilla organizations. Colombia's largest and oldest guerrilla group, Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) began in the late 1960's in response to a U.S.-sponsored attack on a Communist-inspired peasant cooperative in the southern Tomila department.5 Today FARC also has the dubious distinction of being the largest guerrilla group in the southern hemisphere, financing itself through kidnapping and ransom, extortion, and the drug trade. National Liberation Army (ELN), the other main guerrilla group, is significantly smaller than FARC. It primarily targets the oil sector and energy infrastructures in its attacks. Finally, United Self-Defense Groups of Colombia (AUC) is the largest paramilitary organization in the country. Though groups like the AUC were declared illegal in Colombia in 1989, funded by the drug trade and support of wealthy landowners, AUC is known for close and open collaboration with Colombia's official armed forces.6
Human Rights Watch reports that “in the debate over U.S. policy in Colombia, the recruitment of children by Colombia's illegal armed groups has been a secondary issue. Concern has focused more intensely on the Colombian military's tolerance and complicity in other grave (human rights) abuses.”7 Previously, the Colombian government and official armed forces were also actively recruiting and using child soldiers. In recent years the Colombian government has made some good faith efforts to end the use and recruitment of child soldiers within its own forces. In 1991, Colombia signed the Optional Protocol, although it has not yet been ratified. In 1997, documentation showed more than 15,000 children serving as soldiers in Colombia's government forces. Two years later the Colombian government demobilized 800 under 18-year-olds from government forces. While there are no current credible reports of children serving in Colombian government forces, there have been reports of the use of children as spies and informers by police and army units. In addition, the government has offered financial incentives for minors to become “peasant soldiers”, a scheme launched by the government at the end of 2002 to build a peasant army of 20,000.8
The phenomena of child soldiers in Colombia is a reflection of deep-rooted poverty and instability due to years of conflict. While some children are abducted into service, others, with few options for either security or sustenance, join militias out of desperation.9 The United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research writes that “the lines between compulsory, voluntary, and forced recruitment are often blurred.” Once in service, child soldiers in Colombia are not protected from the horrors of combat. Human Rights Watch, in an interview with demobilized child soldiers in Colombia, found that children not only fought but also participated in human rights crimes such as torture, assassinations, and executions of non-military actors. Despite some efforts being made by the Colombian government to reintegrate demobilized child soldiers, the lack of an overall campaign to end the practice amounts to a failure to protect the human rights of these children on the part of the Colombian government.10
The lasting effect of child soldiering is recognized in the Optional Protocol, and states that agree to its terms are “disturbed by the harmful and widespread impact of armed conflict on children and the long-term consequences it has for durable peace, security and development.”11 Effects to children include physical and emotional scarring, disrupted psychological development, violent tendencies when removed from the conflict setting, and a lack of any peacetime skills.12 The impact is not confined within a country's borders. One need only to look to contemporary situations such as the recent fighting in Liberia to see militarizing children endangers the stability of entire regions. While it has been argued by some states that recruiting and using minors in armed service could be necessary for national security, the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research counters this claim in a report, stating that “the effects of armed conflict on children are devastating, not only for children themselves but for their societies.”13 Singer writes that “a particularly pernicious characteristic of child soldiering is the potential to ruin the lives of children and, in doing so, lay the groundwork for future conflict.”14 According to the CIA World Factbook, almost 30% of Colombia's population is under the age of 1415--a substantial population that could be the future hope or the future fighters of their country.
1 McManimom, Shannon and Stohl, Rachel. 2001. “Use of Children as Soldiers.” Foreign Policy in Focus, Vol. 6. , 1
2Ibid
3Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict,” http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/6/protocolchild.htm. Last accessed July 5, 2007.
4 United States Agency for International Development, “Latin America and the Caribbean: Colombia Overview,” http://www.usaid.gov/locations/latin_america_caribbean/country/colombia/, June 30, 2007.
5Center for International Policy, “Colombia Program,” www.ciponline.org//colombia/infocombat.htm. Last accessed June 12, 2007.
6Ibid
7 Human Rights Watch, “You'll Learn Not to Cry: Child Combatants in Colombia,” hrw.org/reports/2003/colombia0903.html, June 22, 2007, 21
8Ibid, 25
9Ibid, 20
10Ibid
11Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, “Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict.”
12Singer, P.W. “Addressing the Global Challenge of Child Soldiers,” Geneva Center for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, www.dcaf.ch/_docs/Yearbook2005/Chapter6.prf, 117. Last accessed July 5, 2007.
13 Alfreson, Lisa, “Child Soldiers, Displacement and Human Security,” United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, www.unidir.org/pdf/articles/pdf_art1728.pdf, June 22, 2007.
14Singer, 119
15 Central Intelligence Agency, “Colombia,” The World Factbook, https://www.cia.gov/library/
publications/the-world-factbook/geos/co.html, June 26, 2007
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