November 7th, 2018 (Nyamilepedia) – The United Nations Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, Virginia Gamba has noted that, in the last four years, the number of human rights violations against children in South Sudan has surpassed those in Afghanistan and Syria.
“The number of violations against children in South Sudan in the last 4 years exceeds those in Afghanistan and Syria,” she said in a statement.
She added that children in South Sudan are subjected to inhumane treatment and made to commit atrocities against their own immediate families.
“They (children) are forced to combat, to commit atrocities against their own people and their family members, so that their links to the past will be severed,” she added.
In the last few months, the United Nations agencies for children, UNICEF, estimated that a total of 9,000 children in South Sudan have been recruited into armed forces and splinter faction by both sides in the conflict.
The study based on observations of children associated with armed forces in South Sudan since the outbreak of violence in 2013, and it includes children wearing military uniforms and carrying weapons, as well as children who are currently undergoing military training in different parts of the country.
