Removing barriers to demobilisation, disarmament and rehabilitation

It can easily be conceded, without weakening the resolution, that war and combat are horrific, damaging experiences. Over the last seventy years, the international community has attempted to limit the suffering that follows the end of a conflict by giving soldiers and civilians access to medical and psychological care. This is now an accepted part of the practice of post-conflict reconstruction, referred to as Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR)[i]. The effects of chronic war and chronic engagement with war are best addressed by a slow and continuous process of habituation to normal life. Former child soldiers are sent to treatment centres specialising in this type of care in states such as Sierra Leone[ii]. What is harmful to this process of recovery is the branding of child soldiers as war criminals. The stigma attached to such a conviction would condemn hundreds of former child soldiers to suffering extended beyond the end of armed conflicts. Sentencing guidelines binding on the ICC state that anyone convicted of war crimes who is younger than eighteen should not be subject to a sentence of life imprisonment. Their treatment, once incarcerated, is required to be oriented toward rehabilitation. Many child soldiers become officers within the organisations that they join. Alternately, they might find themselves ordered to seek more recruits from their villages and communities. For these children participation in the conflict becomes participation in the crime itself. What began as a choice of necessity during war-time could, under the status quo, damage and stigmatise a child during peace-time[iii]. Even if their sentence emphasises reform and education, a former child soldier is likely to become an uninjured casualty of the war, marked out as complicit in acts of aggression. When labelled as such children will become vulnerable to reprisal attacks and entrenched social exclusion. Discussing attempts to foster former Colombian child combatants, the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers state that, “The stigmatization of child soldiers, frequently perceived as violent and threatening, meant that families were reluctant to receive former child soldiers. Those leaving the specialized care centres moved either to youth homes or youth protection facilities for those with special protection problems. While efforts continued to strengthen fostering and family-based care, approximately 60 per cent of those entering the DDR program were in institutional care in 2007.”[iv] Crucially, fear of being targeted by the ICC may lead former child soldiers to avoid disclosing their status to officials running demobilisation programs. They may be deterred from participating in the DDR process[v]. Moreover, the authority of the ICC is often subject to criticism on the international stage by politicians and jurists linked to both democratic states[vi] and the non-liberal or authoritarian regimes most likely to become involved in conflicts that breach humanitarian law. It cannot assist the claims of the ICC to be a body that represents universal concepts of compassion and justice if it is seen to target children- often barely in their teens- in the course of prosecuting war crimes. As the Child Soliders 2008 Global Report notes, “Prosecutions should not, by focusing solely on the recruitment and use of child soldiers, exclude other crimes committed against children. Such an approach risks stigmatizing child soldiers and ignores the wider abuses experienced by children in conflict situations. It is on these grounds that some have questioned the exclusive child-soldier focus of the ICC’s charges against Thomas Lubanga. After all, the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC/L), the armed group he led, is widely acknowledged to have committed numerous other serious crimes against children, as well as adults.”[vii] [i] “Case Studies in War to Peace Transition”, Coletta, N., Kostner, M., Widerhofer, I. The World Bank, 1996 [ii] “Return of Sierra Leone’s Lost Generation”, The Guardian, 02 March 2000, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2000/mar/02/sierraleone?INTCMP=SRCH [iii] “Agony Without End for Liberia’s Child Soldiers”, The Guardian, 12 July 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jul/12/liberia-child-soldiers?INTCMP=SRCH [iv] “Child Soldiers: Global Report 2008”, Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, 2007, p103, http://www.childsoldiersglobalreport.org/files/country_pdfs/FINAL_2008_Global_Report.pdf [v] “Child Soldiers: Global Report 2008”, Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, 2007, p16, http://www.childsoldiersglobalreport.org/files/country_pdfs/FINAL_2008_Global_Report.pdf [vi] “America Attacked for ICC Tactics”, The Guardian, 27 August 2002, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/aug/27/usa.ianblack?INTCMP=SRCH [vii] “Child Soldiers: Global Report 2008”, Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, 2007, pp32-33, http://www.childsoldiersglobalreport.org/files/country_pdfs/FINAL_2008_Global_Report.pdf