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For more than seven years there has been a war in Mali which started on the 16th of January 2012 and now children are being brought into it. Islamist and Taureg groups are using child soldiers to fight their battles for them, in the first six months of 2019, 150 children were killed and 75 injured. Additionally, recruitment of child soldiers has doubled in the same period of time compared to last year. Some children join willingly to fight for independence while others have nowhere else to go. More than 900 schools are closed in Mali due to safety issues. These children are being killed, injured, sexually assaulted, separated from their families and exposed to psychological trauma.
Taureg groups are fighting against the Islamists for independence of Northern Mali. Children are being used as soldiers because they have nowhere else to go and are malleable. They are still being subject to this violence which has carried on for several years because the Western world is not hearing about it. None of the atrocities happening in Mali or anywhere else in Northern Africa are being broadcasted on the news. Not only are these children being forced to engage in warfare but it is also impacting on every aspect of their lives. UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore says that “children should be going to school and playing with their friends, not worrying about attacks or being forced to fight.” While this statement is true, nothing is being done about it because no country that has the power to stop it is doing anything. UNICEF created a child protection in emergencies programme for the children in Mali but only 26% of it was funded.
In the Universal Declaration of Human Rights it states the fundamental rights that everyone should have and was formed by people from different backgrounds, cultural and legal, to ensure that it is universal. Article 3 states that “everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.'' The violence taking place in Mali against children is violating this since they do not have liberty as they are being forced to fight and they have no security since they have nowhere safe to go to. Another article that is being violated is Article 5, “no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”, all of these children are being treated inhumanely by being forced into this war. Corinne Dufka, the Director at Human Rights Watch in West Africa told the Telegraph
“I’ve spoken with witnesses describing how children were ripped from the arms of their mothers and murdered in front of them, blown up by powerful explosive devices and dumped in a well after being hacked to death.”
Violence against children in Mali or any warring country is not an easy issue to solve. According to Corinne Dufka, the Director at Human Rights Watch in West Africa “the Malian government has to do more to protect vulnerable families and bring the perpetrators, from all armed groups, to justice...” Watchlist’s Children and Armed Conflict Monthly Update from June 2019 says that The Coordination des Mouvements de l’Azawad (CMA), a coalition made up of Taureg and Arab nationalist parties must implement their action plan which they formed with the UN in March 2017. Moreover, other countries must publicly commit to fight for children’s rights and demand a ceasefire from all groups involved.
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