Cheap Guns Make Kids Warriors: Study

United Nations: Cheap, light weapons are helping turn children into vicious warriors in many countries, researchers said in a report released recently at the United Nations.

More than 300,000 people under the age of 18 are fighting as soldiers in 34 conflicts, many of them wielding automatic weapons, according to the study commissioned by the Canadian government.

As weapons become easier to use, forces have become more inclined to put children on the front lines, experts said.

”Children kill because they have the instruments to kill,” said retired Lt. Gen. Romeo Dallaire, a Canadian who commanded UN forces during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. ”They either kill under duress because they are afraid of others who will kill them, or they have developed a desire to retain the power of the small arms and the weapons they have.”

In the hands of frightened youngsters who are sometimes sent into battle drunk or drugged, automatic weapons are used ”beyond any semblance of discipline, any semblance of logic, any semblance of humanness,” Dallaire said.

Africa’s wars involve more than 120,000 children, the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers said in a separate study last month. Myanmar has 50,000 child soldiers, the world’s highest number.

In Mozambique, children made up 23% of the ruling FRELIMO party’s forces and 18-40% of the opposition RENAMO forces during the 16-year civil war that ended in 1992, researchers said. In Angola, the use of child soldiers has kept millions of youngsters out
of school and illiterate.

Sometimes, the weapons given to children don’t even contain ammunition. But they give youth the power to rob and intimidate their elders causing deep psychological damage.

And not all armed children are in war zones, researchers noted.

In Colombia, which accounts for 58% of the world’s firearm killings, armed youth have carried out assassinations, the report said. In other countries, including the United States, light weapons are used to arm young drug dealers.

The report urged countries to create an international system for marking and tracking guns something being discussed by negotiators at the UN small arms conference. It also called for a crackdown on the sale of guns to regions in conflict.

UN peacekeepers should also offer child fighters psychological counselling and programs to teach them how to relate to other children, the report said. Former child soldiers are often treated as common refugees despite lagging behind their peers in education and social development.

(From the files of AP Online)