I also urge you to support a minimum age of at least eighteen for voluntary recruitment. Research has clearly shown that the only way to ensure that children do not participate in armed conflict is to ensure that they are not recruited in the first place. For this reason, I believe that no child under the age of eighteen should be subject to any form of recruitment. Ending the use of child soldiers requires actions from all governments. I urge you to support ratification of the optional protocol without delay, and without reservations.
Children have no place in war.
I urge you to ensure United States leadership in ending this appalling practice by supporting swift US ratification of the child soldiers protocol. An estimated 300,000 children under the age of eighteen are currently fighting in approximately thirty different conflicts. Child soldiers are used to carry supplies, to act as spies, messengers and lookouts, and frequently, to fight on the front lines of combat. These child soldiers both witness and take part in terrible violence. They are denied their childhood, their education, and too often, their very lives.