Child soldiers in Sierra Leone
Nearly half of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), and a quarter of the government armed forces consisted of children aged 8–14 years old.
[1][2] During the decade-long civil conflict which took place in Sierra Leone between 1991 and 2002, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), state forces and state-supported militias conscripted children for use in combat.
The RUF kidnapped and forced children to fight from when the civil conflict began, and up to eighty percent of their numbers were aged from seven to fourteen and served in the Small Boys Unit.
[17] Early in the war, recruitment focused on those children whose family structures were poor or absent, promising protection and a sense of community.
They primarily focus on the needs of the child and often fail to adequately prepare families for receiving and facilitating reintegration of the victim.
[23] This system is used in coordination with other political and reconstruction mechanisms to ensure that long-term sustainable reintegration support is provided and to prevent Sierra Leone returning to violent conflict.
In March 2004 the Secretary-General of the United Nations proposed that UNAMSIL's mandate be extended to December 2005 due to the fragile nature of the state's Government and concern that they were not ready to assume responsibility for the country's security.
[24] UNICEF (United Nations Children's Fund) was a principle agency assisting the Government and other third party organisations in employing the DDR program throughout Sierra Leone between 1998 and 2002.
[25] UNICEF provided protection for demobilized children within their interim care centres (ICC) whilst they conducted family tracing exercises to achieve reunification.
[28] It operates specifically in Freetown and its reintegration approach is focused on providing informal education, social work, advocacy and health care initiatives to male ex-combatants who are under 18 years old and female victims of sexual abuse.
Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE) provides education for females across Africa, including in Freetown Sierra Leone.
They further expanded this program through establishing community sensitisation services focused on enabling the reintegration of females with babies who were the product of sexual violation during conflict.
Militant groups including the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) subjected these child soldiers to training methods which hardened them through making them immune to violence.
They were taught that this type of heinous behaviour and ideological thinking was a normalised process and they were not allowed to demonstrate remorse for their actions.
[26] This invoked severe psychological effects including: anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, hostility and aggression on many of the victims.
Issues relating to the communication between victims and their families concerning the severity of the soldiers adolescent experiences were evident during the reintegration process.
It was evident that where caregivers were unable to monitor and understand the severity of the victims exposure to violence, it heavily affected the child's ability to reintegrate into the community.
[22] As a result of this "re-victimization" it was common for these females to have no choice but to stay with their rebel "husbands" in order to survive or choose prostitution to generate disposable income to support themselves.
[25] In response to this exclusion, UNICEF established the 'Girls Left Behind Project' which focused on: appropriating services to 1000 females, tracing 65% of their families, educating communities to ensure they did not suffer from further exploitations.
Some ex-RUF children have evaded the DDR process because they fear that they will be criminally prosecuted for their involvements with the atrocities committed by the RUF and be victims to the negative stigmatisation attached to their actions.
Three members of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) were found guilty of various human rights abuses, which included the recruitment of children for use in combat.
