Should Child Soldiers Be Granted Amnesty

918 Words2 Pages

The use of child soldiers has been a huge issue for a course of many years. However, the question still remains whether or not child soldiers should be given amnesty for their crimes. The debate regarding child soldiers has prolonged for years and as of yet there appears to be no definite answer.

My answer is that child soldiers should be given amnesty.

Unless the children are willing to be a child soldier to seek for revenge, the majority of child soldiers should be granted amnesty because these children are forced by commanders through false promises, drugs and things which you can’t even imagine, killing innocent civilians, other children, and even their own families, so it isn’t entirely their fault. These children, also, have no other …show more content…

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child defines “child” broadly as “every human being below the age of 18 years. This means that most of the “child soldiers are younger than the age of 18.

International Criminal Court Article 26 prohibits the court from prosecuting anyone under the age of 18.

“The Court shall have no jurisdiction over any person who was under the age of 18 at the time of the alleged commission of a crime.” (Article 26, Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court).

This law proves wrong to many who think that there is no law enforcing the use of child soldiers under 18 and clearly states that there should be no child soldiers under the age of 18 because it is illegal for them to hold criminal responsibility at such a young age.

However, in spite of this child soldiers are still put on trial and jailed for their actions.
Instead, they should be forgiven and given amnesty for the mistake they made. . . .

As I had claimed before, these children are being forced by severe beatings and …show more content…

Drugs and alcohol were prevalent and served as [a] prerequisite for combat activities. Fighting with a gun is not an easy task because it puts so much pressure on the mind. So we needed to free the mind by taking drugs, and it worked.”

This evidence shows us how easily the soldiers used the drugs as magical wands to trap children and actually make them “enjoy” what they are doing. From seeing this soldier talking about drugs so easily, we can see how much they might have used to brain where these innocent children. . . .

A recent report also shows how these children may have been influenced and why they could possibly be in the situation they are right now.

UNICEF, the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, reports that the LRA, Lord's Resistance Army, which is a rebel group and heterodox Christian cult which operates in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, abducted children as young as 5 but mostly between the ages of 8 and 16, often after killing their parents in front of them.

These children, not knowing what to do, will follow their insights by following the footsteps of adults looking for someway to survive, even if that meant surviving as a child

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Should Child Soldiers Be Granted Amnesty

Globalization Increases Child Soldiery