ACTION ALERT - JULY 2003

GOOD SHEPHERD VOICES FOR JUSTICE

STOP THE USE OF CHILD SOLDIERS

BACKGROUND

More than 300,000 children under the age of 18 are currently fighting in conflicts around the world. Hundreds of thousands more have been recruited into armed forces and could be sent into combat at any moment. Although most child soldiers are teenagers, some are as young as 7 years old.

Because of their emotional and physical immaturity, children are easily manipulated and can be drawn into violence that they are too young to resist or understand. The use of child soldiers around the world is one of the most deplorable human rights abuses today. Both boys and girls are used in armed conflicts in the front line, as spies, messengers, sentries, porters, servants, or to lay or clear landmines. Over two million child soldiers have been killed in armed conflicts, six million have been maimed or permanently disabled, one million orphaned, and ten million psychologically traumatized. The use of children as soldiers offends all standards of human decency and international law.

Representatives Tom Lantos (D-CA) and Frank R. Wolf (R-VA), co-chairs of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, have initiated a letter to Secretary Powell regarding the use of child soldiers. The letter asks the U.S. government to take specific steps to help end the use of children in war.

ACTION

Please call, e-mail or fax your representative in Congress and ask them to sign on to the letter drafted by Rep. Tom Lantos and Rep. Frank Wolf. Please act as soon as possible. We hope to get a large group of signers to send a strong message to the administration about the importance of this issue. The full text of the letter is below.

Call:

Members of Congress who wish to sign on should be encouraged to contact Ilima Loo (office of Rep. Tom Lantos) at: 202/225-3531 or Sean Woo (Rep. Frank Wolf) at 202/225-5136.

Write, email, Fax:

Write to Senators at the U.S. Senate, Washington, DC 20510, or call 202/224-3121; e-mail and fax contacts can be identified at www.senate.gov - more specifically, by going to www.senate.gov/contacting/index.cfm

Write to Members of Congress at the U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515, or call 202/225-3121. For a directory of the members of the House of Representative, including phone numbers, go to http://www.house.gov/

Thank you for considering these actions.

FULL TEXT OF LETTER:

Congressional Letter to Secretary Powell:

Honorable Colin Powell Secretary of State United States Department of State Washington DC

Dear Secretary Powell,

We are writing to thank you for the strong support that you and the Bush administration have given to ending the use of children as soldiers around the world, and to encourage you to take further actions to end this appalling abuse.

We are proud that on December 23rd, the United States formally ratified an international treaty (the optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflicts) that prohibits the forced recruitment of children under age eighteen, or their use in combat. We were also pleased to see the United States take leadership on this issue in January by pushing for stronger measures by the United Nations Security Council to monitor governments and armed groups using children in armed conflict, and to hold them accountable for their actions.

However, we believe that our country must do more. In more than twenty countries around the globe, children are coerced, driven by desperation, or compelled by societal pressures to take up arms and fight in war. According to current estimates, 300,000 children are currently fighting in armed conflicts on nearly every continent. The use of children as soldiers offends all standards of human decency and international law.

We are writing to urge the administration to address three of the most appalling situations where children are being used in warfare-Northern Uganda, Burma, and Colombia. In Northern Uganda, a rebel group called the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has forcibly abducted thousands of children from their homes and schools for use as soldiers in its war against the Ugandan government. These children are brutally treated, and girls are given to older commanders as "wives." They are often compelled to beat or hack to death other children who have tried to escape or refused orders. In recent months, the situation has only gotten worse. In response to a Ugandan military offensive, the rate of abductions has dramatically increased, and one local organization estimates that as many as 4,000 children have been abducted just since June of last year.

The use of child soldiers around the world is one of the most deplorable human rights abuses today. Both boys and girls are used in armed conflicts in the front line, as spies, messengers, sentries, porters, servants, or to lay or clear landmines. Over two million child soldiers have been killed in armed conflicts, six million have been maimed or permanently disabled, one million orphaned, and ten million psychologically traumatized. The use of children as soldiers offends all standards of human decency and international law.