Disarming the Child Soldiers

Some of the older children fought against the Taleban, but many others are little more than slaves, forcibly recruited to work for local commanders and warlords.

Nearly 8,000 child soldiers – defined by international law as combatants aged under 18 - are scattered throughout Afghanistan, according to the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, which is now working to disarm and demobilise them.

They are part of the many militia units left over from the years of factional warfare, which are themselves being gradually disarmed and disbanded to make way for the new Afghan National Army.

The children do have guns, but only for when they are on guard duty. But for much of the time they bear little resemblance to soldiers, simply working in their commanders' houses or on their land in return for three meals a day.

In some cases, especially where the paramilitary commanders use young male recruits for sex, UNICEF's campaign seems more like a project to free children from bondage.

“I had a lot of problems. The commander used to gamble with his friends until midnight, so I had to do guard duty as well as make tea. But some nights, the commander himself would force me to have sex and would rape me,” one such recruit told IWPR.

Now aged 14, this boy has just been swept up by the demobilisation programme which has reached his village in Faryab province of northwestern Afghanistan.

But he was still fearful, as the village is still the personal fiefdom of the local militia leader.

“We are poor people and we cannot complain to anyone because the commander would kill my father,” he said.

It is a fear expressed by other children whom UNICEF is trying to help through its Child Soldiers Disarmament and Demobilisation Programme, launched last month and aimed at boys aged between 11 and 17.

According to the UN, no child soldier will remain in a military force once the programme is completed.

To see the plan through, officials are working through village elders who know which local commanders have child soldiers. The officials get the elders to talk to the commanders and persuade them to hand the children to UNICEF.

At the same time, UNICEF has asked some non-governmental organisations, NGOs to do the same job on its behalf.

More than 500 child soldiers have been disarmed since the latest programme began in western Afghanistan. It is now concentrating on the north and northwest of the country.

“There are still some armed groups in Afghanistan who have recruited child soldiers,” UNICEF spokesman Edward Carwardine told IWPR.

Implicitly acknowledging the risk of sexual abuse faced by child soldiers, he said, “All demobilised children will be tested medically for the HIV threat and then they will be provided with durable alternative opportunities to military life, including education and vocational skills trainings.”

Last year, during a general disarmament programme for adult men, some 3,000 children recruited by local commanders who worked with the defence ministry, were disarmed and demobilised. Most of them were in Afghanistan's central and northeast provinces.

Among these children, said the spokesman, a small number were found to be infected with HIV.

Nine out of ten child soldiers are uneducated, said the spokesman, promising that UNICEF would provide literacy courses for them.

Carwardine said local NGOs registered with his organisation would be responsible for integrating the children back into normal life.

According to him, local militia commanders had shown interest in the children's reintegration and had not expressed any opposition to the programme.

One such commander, who still had child soldiers working for him, praised the programme, saying, "There isn't the need to keep the children any more."

From his stronghold in Sar-e-Pul province, this paramilitary leader, who did not want his name disclosed, said he had only taken children on in order to help them.

“The war has now ended in Afghanistan. We don’t need any armed men, but we kept the children on because if we let them go, they would have become unemployed. Now we are very happy that the UN will reintegrate them,” he said.

In the same province, one 15-year-old boy soldier - a thin and sick looking child dressed in over-large military gear, although he had never actually fought - still expressed fears for the future.

He would not give his name, nor say whether he had been sexually abused, but acknowledged he had been harshly beaten by the local commander.

“I have been working at the commander’s home for three years. I cook and clean in the day and during the nights I have to do guard duty for more than six hours. I get no pay, just three meals a day," he told IWPR.

"Sometimes I get so tired I can't do the commander’s housework, or I fall asleep on duty at night. Then he beats me a lot, saying I'm being insolent to him."

He said he had heard about the UN demobilisation campaign from elders in his village and was very pleased about it.

"Even though my life has been destroyed during the past three years I really want to become educated and able to work so that I won’t be a burden on others,” he said.

But he added, “This commander is very powerful and I am very afraid that if the UN goes away, he’s likely to recruit me as a soldier again.”

Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi is an IWPR staff reporter in Mazar-e-Sharif.