De findes i store dele af verden – drenge og piger med våben i hånden – og konsekvenserne for dem, både fysiske og psykiske, er gruopvækkende, alligevel mangler mange lande at skrive under på konvention, som forbyder det.
NEW YORK, 12 February 2013 (UN News Service): From the besieged cities of Syria to the desert battlefields of Mali, children throughout the world continue to endure the indignities of forced conscription (tvangsudskrivning til krigstjeneste).
They suffer the resulting legacy of combat on their health and well-being, a top United Nations official warned Tuesday.
In an appeal marking the International Day against the Use of Child Soldiers, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, Leila Zerrougui, cautioned that thousands of children continue to be “abducted, recruited, killed, maimed (lemlæstet), or raped in conflicts around the world,” including the ongoing wars in Syria and Mali.
“Children in conflict are separated from their families, are forced to kill, and experience violence and abuse,” Ms. Zerrougui stated together with Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs, adding that without serious attention to this issue, the “credibility of the international child protection system will suffer.”
While commending the progress made in fighting the scourge of child soldiers, Ms. Ashton called on Member States to join in the global effort to end forced conscription of minors.
“Many countries and armed groups have signed action plans with the United Nations to end underage recruitment which have resulted in the release and reintegration of children, as well as the prosecution of perpetrators,” Ms. Ashton stated, noting:
“I urge other parties to follow suit with immediate effect.”
49 lande mangler
According to the UN’s Office for Disarmament Affairs, 144 Member States have so far ratified the Optional (frivillige) Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict.
The document calls on States which ratify it to “take all feasible measures” to ensure that members of their armed forces under the age of 18 do not take a direct part in hostilities.
Nevertheless, despite the progress in winning supporters from the international community, 49 Member States have yet to ratify the Protocol.
Ms. Zerrougui, however, promised reinvigorated (fornyede) efforts to root out child recruitment through close collaboration between the UN and its partners.
“As a committed partner to child protection, we will continue to work hand in hand with the European Union and reach out to new regional partners in an effort to make the world a safer place for children,” she said.
Glad for dom over krigsherre
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http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=44126&Cr=child+soldiers&Cr1=#.URqilGV1T4s
Begynd fra: “The two officials also expressed hope that the sentencing….”
