Child Combatants and Children Associated with Armed Groups

International organizations estimate that about 300,000 children and adolescents (under the age of 18) are abused as child soldiers on a world-wide scale. Children are recruited by ‘regular’

armies or abducted by irregular armed groups for a multitude of tasks and/or they are dependants of combatants. While some are forced to take part in combat, others have to work as messengers, domestic servants, carriers of heavy loads, and/or sexual slaves. When children are recruited or abducted at a young age into rebel groups or military structures, their natural, healthy development will be impaired and a multitude of physical, psychological, and mental problems will result. Furthermore, early recruitment prevents the young from regular schooling and training, learning social rules and norms, building peer networks, and acquiring the skills for healthy, intimate relationships. Although the UN principles on children associated with armed forces, known as the Paris Principles (United Nations, 2007a), clearly demand specialized psychosocial care for children at all stages of the DDR process, the current approaches in reality

12 To avoid stigmatization and the exclusion of children who might not have carried a weapon, the literature also refers to this group as ‘children associated with fighting forces’ or ‘formerly abducted children.’

75 focus on brief vocational training, family tracing, and reunification. It is often assumed that if a child lives with his or her family again, the psychological wounds will automatically heal. This is, however, not the case for many children who suffer from severe mental distress and are in need of specialized care (Annan, et al., 2006).

Box 1: Case Study-- Uganda

Since more than 20 years, the conflict in northern Uganda between the LRA (Lord’s Resistance Army) and the Ugandan government led to thousands of deaths and the internal displacement of about 1.6 million civilians. An estimated number of 25,000 abducted children were involved as forced fighters, porters and sex slaves on the side of the rebels. Annan et al. (2006) found in their Survey for War Affected Youth in Uganda that about one quarter of the children and youth in northern Uganda, whether formerly abducted or not, suffered from high levels of emotional distress. In most of the formerly abducted children in Uganda, PTSD is accompanied by signs of depression, substance abuse, as well as severe personality and developmental disorders (Amone-P'Olak, 2005;

Derluyn, Broekaert, Schuyten, & De Temmerman, 2004; Magambo & Lett, 2004).

In a large research project by the international NGO vivo and the University of Konstanz, Germany, (Biedermann, 2007; Glöckner, 2007), the PTSD-prevalence rate reached 12.5% in reception centers, a major depressive episode was diagnosed in 2.5%, and suicide risk was present in 17.5% of the 40 interviewed formerly abducted children. Nevertheless, there were strong hints that a full-blown picture of PTSD might emerge in many of the children after having left the reception center, once they were reintegrated back in the community. Therefore, a trauma-focused treatment, namely Narrative Exposure Therapy (NET) was initiated for formerly abducted children with PTSD diagnosis, as well as abductees not presenting with a diagnosis. Expert follow-ups after three months and one year revealed very positive effects of NET in reducing the PTSD symptom-load in formerly abducted children with PTSD. Furthermore, a randomized, controlled prevention-trial showed the tendency that NET is even capable of reducing sub-syndromal PTSD symptom-load, suggesting a preventative effect. These results confirm that thorough, high-quality screening is the key to identifying former child soldiers with PTSD, as well as sub-syndromal cases at high risk for developing PTSD.

76 3.1.2 Women

Only in recent years, women were included in DDR programs. Women, who are associated with armed groups, are either female combatants (although they are often a small group), dependants of male combatants, or abducted women kept in slavery. The women (both combatant and non-combatant) assume domestic duties in the group, and many are forced to serve as wives or sexual slaves. Because many women are abused and raped by armed forces, such as in the Eastern DRC, special support programs outside DDR have begun to emerge. Returning women, who are perceived to have had sexual relations with other combatants - whether by force or by voluntary choice - and/or who bring back children from such encounters belong to the most stigmatized group of survivors. In many non-Western cultural settings, they are unable to get married or find a new supportive partnership, within which to bring up their children in civilian life.

It is important to understand that for female ex-combatants, demobilization is often linked to a change in their gender-role and identity, which is accompanied by a loss of decision-making power and self-sufficiency. Though many female combatants suffer sexual abuse (Engdahl, de Silva, Solomon, & Somasundaram, 2003), they are at the same time freed from patriarchal gender roles to a certain degree (United Nations Development Programme, & United Nations Population Fund, 2006). After they leave their fighting faction, many women ex-combatants settle in urban centers to escape pressure from their families and communities to once again fit into discriminatory roles (Mehreteab, 2002). Unfortunately, this often alienates them further from society and frequently leaves them in poverty and socially isolated, which once again acerbates the psychological problems caused by organized violence. Women combatants need special reintegration tools, which take into account that they have to make their living in a society that most definitely will discriminate against women. To date much has been written about and little has been done in taking gender-differentiated needs in DDR seriously (De Watteville, 2002).

Particular attention has to be paid to women ex-combatants and victims of sexual violence and/or gender-based violence. Furthermore, cultural attitudes towards widows and culturally appropriate ways of respecting and seeking the views of women have to be developed.

Please see next page for case study Angola.

77 Box 2: Case study-- Angola:

The Angolan Demobilization and Reintegration Program (ADRP) is funding a business training and micro-finance project for 400 widows and female ex-combatants. Nearly 3,000 women ex-combatants or women associated with ex-combatants, are receiving reintegration support under the project. While a relatively small percentage of registered ex-combatants are women (3%), the project caters to women associated with the fighting forces and other vulnerable women in the communities where ex-combatants have settled. In their report ‘Struggling Through Peace: Return and Resettlement in Angola,’ Human Rights Watch (2003) expressed concern that the DDR process excluded women, in particular the wives and widows of former UNITA combatants, women abandoned by UNITA combatants, and women and girls abducted during the war and forced to join UNITA forces as ‘wives’, porters, or in other functions. These women are still suffering the social and psychological effects of the war.