Child Soldiers

There are still over 300,000 child soldiers in the world despite legislation 10 years ago that was aimed at preventing this terrible situation. Today is the 10th anniversary of Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict.

Despite what you might picture, 40% of the soldiers are actually girls.

Retired Lieutenant-General and current Canadian Senator Romeo Dallaire saw first-hand the effect of conflict on children when he commanded the UN mission in Rwanda in 1994. In recent years, he has worked to help end the practice of using child soldiers around the world: Along with relentless advocacy efforts, Dallaire founded the Child Soldiers Initiative to help raise awareness about the issue, and wrote the book "They Fight Like Soldiers, They Die Like Children."


He will also ask Parliament to consider using the sanction of the International Criminal Court to pursue those who finance and employ child soldiers, such as the financiers of piracy in the Horn of Africa (where many pirates are children, abducted and put to work by their adult bosses), and funding education and employment alternatives for children in the region.


Here is General Dallaire's organisation:
http://childsoldiersinitiative.org/  and another: http://www.warchild.ca/ that are trying to help put an end to children being involved in wars (one of the 6 worst forms of child labour- if you remember our unit from the start of the year).