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Death By Child: Calling Recruiters of Child Soldiers to Account

JURIST Contributing Editor David Crane of Syracuse University College of Law, former Chief Prosecutor for the UN Special Court for Sierra Leone, says that US officials need to move forward to establish the rules and regulations necessary under the new Child Soldiers Accountability Act and set an example for other nations so that those who have destroyed children?s lives in conflicts in Africa and elsewhere around the world are dealt with....

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Of all the combatants during the horror that was the civil war in Sierra Leone in the 1990s, none were feared the most than that of a child, the infamous child soldiers that literally raped, murdered and plundered their way across that hapless backwater of a country. Torn from families, forced to kill their parents, hopped up on drugs, they tore into their fellow citizens without mercy in a senseless orgy of pain and suffering. These children were dragged off into the bush to fight wars for drug lords, terrorists, gun runners, diamond dealers, and cynical politicians, and in some instances corporations.

I recall one witness telling me that they were terrified of the child soldiers that made up most of the various combatant groups fighting in Sierra Leone, because they could not plead for mercy prior to death as the children didn?t know what that meant, they could not tell the difference between right or wrong, good from evil. For ten years these small boy units made Sierra Leone a living hell.

Since the late 1980s, there have been millions of children recruited into combat around the world. A United Nations report in the mid-1990s found that over 2 million have died since 1988 alone. The report shamed the world and slowly the international community began to respond.

In 2003, I indicted those who bore the greatest responsibility for those crimes in Sierra Leone, to include, for the first time in history, the unlawful recruitment of children into an armed force under the age of 15. It was upheld as a new international crime by our appellate chamber at the Special Court for Sierra Leone and most of the 13 indictees were convicted of that unlawful recruitment. The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, has also charged warlords in Africa for similar crimes.

On October 3, 2008, under the leadership of Senator Richard Durban of Illinois, the Child Soldiers Accountability Act was signed by President Bush into law. Designed to identify potential perpetrators and to prosecute them under US domestic law and/or to prevent entry or deport them from the US, this important law is another example of nations leading the way in stamping out this scourge. It certainly gives notice to dozens of countries that may be in violation of this act. Senator Durban stated: "The power to prosecute and punish those who violate the law will send a clear signal that the U.S. will in no way tolerate this abhorrent practice."

Currently the implementation of the law is being worked by the Departments of Justice, State, and Homeland Security and will make the passage of the Child Soldier Accountability Act a reality. Those officials need to continue to move forward to establish the rules and regulations necessary to ensure that those who have destroyed children's lives are dealt with under this new law.

Leadership by the United States in this area is vital. We have the law now to lead the rest of the world in ensuring something is done. Hopefully, action by other states in revising their domestic laws similar to the Child Soldier Accountability Act will be a way for progress to be made. Continued international recognition of this international crime and its elimination must continue with all dispatch.

In the 21st Century how can mankind look itself in the mirror with any sense of hope for a brighter future when most of the fighters in various international and internal armed conflicts are kids, many under the age of 15? Those lost generations will come back to haunt us from the graves of the victims of death by child.

David M. Crane is a professor at Syracuse University College of Law, and former founding Chief Prosecutor for the UN Special Court for Sierra Leone (2002-2005).

Full post as published by JURIST - Forum on November 12, 2008 (boomark / email).