Children in the Syrian War: Tortured by One Side, Recruited by the Other
A new UN report comes amid staggering casualty numbers and Obama's confirmation that the regime has used chemical weapons.
SOPHIA JONES JUN 14 2013, 9:25 AM
A boy, a member of the Free Syrian Army, poses with his weapon in Aleppo on December 29, 2012. (Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters)
Last May, Syrian government forces stormed a primary school in As-Safira, Aleppo and took 55 children hostage, using them as human shields. This incident, as detailed in an annual United Nations report on children released this week, points to widespread atrocities committed against Syrian children by both government and opposition forces like the Free Syria Army (FSA).
"In Syria, schools are used as barracks and torture centers," said Leila Zerrougui, UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict in an interview. "Children detained [are] sexually abused, raped, or [threatened that] their sisters will be raped. They are paying a very high price."
The report mentions a slew of abuses, including the recruitment of child soldiers, sexual violence and rape as a tool of war, the use of heavy weaponry and cluster munitions against civilian populations where children are present, and the targeting of schools and hospitals, which are protected under international law. In Syria, many children have not been to school in more than two years.
Children of opposition members and rebel fighters are routinely imprisoned by government forces and subjected to "electric shock, beatings, stress positions and threats and acts of sexual torture," according to the study. They are used as pawns to extract information on rebel involvement in local populations. Often, children are held for ransom until family members turn themselves into the government, facing almost certain death.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/06/children-in-the-syrian-war-tortured-by-one-side-recruited-by-the-other/276876/
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