Article September 15, 2003 Issue

REVERENCE for LIFE—a call to prayer for child soldiers

Paco Garcia with contributions from Mayal Tshiabuila

Mayal Tshiabuila lives in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. A former special assistant to the local coordinator of the United Nations Development Program, Tshiabuila gained a broad view of programs to help demobilize child soldiers. He spoke recently with Paco Garcia of Le Héraut de la Christian Science about the burgeoning problem of child soldiers in Central Africa.

Mayal, please tell us how this phenomenon of child soldiers came about.

In Central Africa there have been armed rebellions for almost a decade, in almost every country in this region. They usually start because some group wants to overthrow the current government. Also, sometimes the conflicts are instigated from the outside, by groups with multinational financial interests or for other reasons. And so the rebels begin to recruit people—even children, including girls. We've seen armed groups of child soldiers as young as ten years old.

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