Myanmar's army releases 51 child soldiers

Rights groups commend action, but urge discharge of hundreds more children.

(Photo: AFP)

Mandalay:  Myanmar’s army on Thursday released 51 children and young people from its armed forces, said the United Nations, which commended the country’s progress toward ending the involvement of children in armed conflict.

The release was the second batch of child soldiers discharged from the army — known as the Tatmadaw — in 2015, bringing the total to 93 children.

Since June 2012, when Myanmar committed to ending the recruitment and use of children in the military by signing a Joint Action Plan with the UN, 646 children have been released by the army, the UN says.

“Recognizing that recruitment and use of underage children is against both international and Myanmar standards, we welcome the official discharge of the children, including those who were accused of desertion — and for not punishing them — as we formally recognize through today’s discharge that they should not have been in the army in the first place,” Renata Lok-Dessallien, UN resident coordinator in Myanmar, said in a statement on Thursday.

There are no verifiable figures on how many children are currently serving in Myanmar's armed forces, which has faced a slew of accusations over rights abuses, including the forced recruitment of children to work as porters or even as human mine detectors.

“Reintegration of children formerly associated with the Tatmadaw requires long-term efforts and continued funding. UNICEF and its partners support the Myanmar government’s commitment to ensuring its children are protected and have access to their basic rights,” said Bertrand Bainvel, UNICEF representative to Myanmar, in a statement on Thursday.

Myanmar’s government agreed in its pact with the UN to register all children in its armed forces by November 2012 and release them from service by December 2013.

But New York-based Human Rights Watch has said that the registration process is “far from complete” and that the Tatmadaw has failed to remove incentives to fulfill unit quotas that encourage child recruitment.

Mg Mg Lay, program director for the Yangon-based Association of Human Rights Defenders and Promoters, said that releasing child soldiers group by group and continuing the recruitment of children under 18 raise concerns about the Tatmadaw’s commitment to ending the use of child soldiers.

He said that the Tamadaw should release all child soldiers at once and release those currently over the age of 18 who were recruited as minors.

“Peace is the key factor for ending recruitment of children as Myanmar’s Tatmadaw and ethnic armed groups still recruit them. I believe that we can tackle the challenge of ending child soldiers by getting internal peace in the country,” said Mg Mg Lay, whose organization monitors the cases of child soldiers.

For years the Myanmar military, as well as non-state armed groups that operate mainly on the periphery of the country, have employed child soldiers in their decades-long civil wars.

The UN said that in addition to the Tatmadaw, seven non-state armed groups, including the Kachin Independence Army and the Karen National Liberation Army, have been named by the UN secretary-general as being “persistent perpetrators” in the recruitment and use of children in conflicts.

Child Soldiers International, a London-based NGO, said in a 28-page report on Myanmar in January 2015 that armed conflict between the state and numerous armed ethnic groups has provided a violent backdrop against which child recruitment and other grave violations of human rights have occurred.

“[We call] on the government to urgently address serious gaps in age verification protocols, recruitment procedures and accountability mechanisms to ensure children are not recruited and used as soldiers in state forces,” said the Child Soldiers International report.

Additional reporting by AFP

Source: ucanews.com