Factbox: Ten facts about child soldiers around the world

Being poor, displaced, separated from their families or living in a combat zone can make children particularly vulnerable to being recruited. Armed groups target children for several reasons. They are easier to manipulate, they don’t need much food and they don’t have a highly developed sense of danger.

Many children are forced to join military groups at a young age. Child soldiers are also easier to manipulate and force into conflict. Recruiters typically target children from troubled areas or conflict zones, likely accustomed to violence and with fewer educational or work opportunities.

• Tens of thousands of children are estimated to be recruited and used by armed groups.
• The Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Syria and Yemen currently have the largest number of child soldiers.

Reasons for recruitment by armed groups Child soldiers are typically recruited because they are seen by armed groups as expendable and cheap to maintain. Countries were led into poverty, disease, war, and kidnapping, which in turn led to forced child labor.

1. 1 Somalia (200,000 Child Soldiers)
2. 2 Burma (50,000 Child Soldiers)
3. 3 Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (30,000 Child Soldiers)
4. 4 Rwanda (20,000 Child Soldiers)
5. 5 Sudan (19,500-22,000 Child Soldiers)
6. 6 Afghanistan (8,000 Child Soldiers)
7. 7 Chad (7,000 – 10,000 Child Soldiers)
8. 8 Burundi (6,000-7,000 Child Soldiers)

Children are given a mixture of cane juice (from sugar cane) and gunpowder which makes them high and is supposed to give them courage to go and fight at the front.”As in another case a worker explained: “Kids are often supplied with drugs; marijuana is the most common drug, but kids are given cocaine too, and cane …

In some conflicts, commanders supply child soldiers with marijuana and opiates to make them “brave” and lessen their fear of combat. Furthermore, commanders may initiate child recruits by forcing them to witness or commit abuses and killings in order to desensitize them to violence.

The report was particularly concerned with the use of younger children, presenting evidence that many thousands of children were being killed, maimed, and psychiatrically injured around the world every year. Further harm is caused when armed forces and groups detain child recruits, according to Human Rights Watch.

According to the 2019 Annual Report of the Secretary-General on children and armed conflict, more than 12,000 children were killed or maimed in conflict zones last year – the highest number since the United Nations started monitoring and reporting this grave violation.

The practice of child soldiers is far more widespread, and more important, than most realize. There are as many as 300,000 children under the age of 18 presently serving as combatants around the globe. Their average age is just over 12 years old.

A long healing process. Regardless of how children are recruited and of their roles, child soldiers are victims, whose participation in conflict bears serious implications for their physical and emotional well-being. They are commonly subject to abuse and most of them witness death, killing, and sexual violence.

More than 8,500 children used as soldiers in 2020: U.N. Reuters.

Child soldiers are any children under the age of 18 who are recruited by a state or non-state armed group and used as fighters, cooks, suicide bombers, human shields, messengers, spies, or for sexual purposes.

These boys and girls, some as young as 8 years old, serve in government forces and armed opposition groups. They may fight on the front lines, participate in suicide missions, and act as spies, messengers, or lookouts. Girls may be forced into sexual slavery.

Why do people use child soldiers? Armed forces can manipulate children easily, they do not eat very much food, and they do not have to be paid. Soldiers take advantage of this and use children as pawns in their dangerous battles.

Sometimes aged only 8, the children are used as soldiers, cooks, messengers or even sex slaves. In the most extreme cases, they have been used as suicide bombers.

Children are exposed to situations of terror and horror during war – experiences that may leave enduring impacts in posttraumatic stress disorder. Severe losses and disruptions in their lives lead to high rates of depression and anxiety in war-affected children. Child soldiers.

The UN has identified 14 countries where children have been widely used as soldiers. These countries are Afghanistan, Colombia, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iraq, Mali, Myanmar, Nigeria, the Philippines, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.

Are child soldiers effective? Yes. Trusting, vulnerable, and often intimidated, children can easily be manipulated, experts say. In combat, children can be daring and tenacious, particularly when under the influence of drugs—a common practice—or when compelled by political or religious zeal.