Stained humanity?

Appearing before the International Court of Justice in April this year, counsel for the Palestinian state claimed Gaza was now home to the largest cohort of child amputees in the world. Elsewhere, the toll inflicted upon children embroiled in armed conflict has been unremitting. It includes child casualties resulting from their recruitment into armed forces and militias, their emotional and physical abuse and persisting traumas of displacement and family dislocation. While the international community has formulated legal, political and criminal responses to some effect, state implementation of necessary remedies to the scourge of child harm in armed conflict remains seriously inadequate.

Nearly a third of the world population is under eighteen. In some regions, children comprise almost half the population. And in the last two decades, approximately a sixth of the world’s children have lived in situations of armed conflict. In her 2024 report to the United Nations secretary-general, his special representative for children and armed conflict, Virginia Gamba, noted almost 33,000 grave violations over the preceding year. They included offences of recruitment and use; killing and maiming; abduction; rape and other forms of sexual violence. Shamefully, such violations have occurred at the hands of UN peackeeping forces, this independently verified. Seriously afflicted by these various offences are those in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar, Somalia, Nigeria and Sudan. ¹

Of the 11,649 killed, most were in these locations with the addition of Burkina Faso, Syria and Ukraine.

This report further noted that, in 2024, violence against children in armed conflict continued at extreme levels, their most basic rights violated — in particular the inherent right to life. Contributing factors included intensified armed conflict, concentration of explosive weapons in urban locations and presence of unexploded remnants of war. As serious was child recruitment into armed operations, destruction of schools and educational facilities, lack of citizenship through failed birth registration and denied access to those most in need of humanitarian assistance.²

Between 2012 and 2022, the number of children affected by armed conflict had doubled. Over that period armed conflict was estimated to have killed more than 2 million children, physically maiming 6 million more. More than 45 million were exposed to severe loss, hardship and vulnerability to exploitation and violence.³ Of the estimated 8 million refugees who had fled Ukraine by the end of March 2022, more than 1.8 million children crossed into neighbouring countries as refugees, 2.5 million internally remaining as displaced. It was one of the fastest large-scale displacements of children since the Second World War.⁴

Persisting impacts
While worsening, the seriousness of this devastation is not new.

Relevant here is a landmark report delivered by Graça Machel in 1996, an outcome of extensive consultations with governments, legal experts, military authorities and civil society organisations. With determined advocacy, this former minister of education in Mozambique managed to raise the salience of child protection in armed conflict situations by placing it at the centre of human rights, peace and security and development agendas.⁵ This report generated significant momentum, including moves to ban landmines, accountability for crimes against children and ending impunity for grave violations. Pressure was mounted for implementation of the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child’s stipulation that states parties ensure respect for rules of international humanitarian law, and through all feasible measures ensure protection and care of children affected by armed conflict.⁶

These efforts were instrumental in the UN General Assembly’s establishment in 1997 of the office of special representative of the UN secretary-general for children and armed conflict.
Subsequent developments included the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) prohibition of the enlistment of children under the age of eighteen as soldiers, this replicated in the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict adopted in 2000.

In 2005, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan established a Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism on Children and Armed Conflict (CAAC), and a Working Group of Security Council Member States to document grave violations against children in armed conflict. While not the first Security Council initiative on this subject, its 2005 Resolution (1612) assumed significance in advancing CAAC on the international community’s agenda. These initiatives fortified international legal frameworks protecting the rights of the child in situations of armed conflict through provisions under international humanitarian, criminal and refugee law, and through labour standards.⁷

Recurring dilemmas
Despite these advances, gaps of significance have remained. Currently more than one in ten children worldwide are affected by armed conflict whether by direct or indirect impacts. The
former include death, physical and psychological trauma and displacement. The latter relates to inadequate and unsafe living conditions, environmental hazards, poor mental health, separation from family, displacement-related health risks and destruction of health, public health, education and economic infrastructure. Under these conditions, children remain vulnerable to targeting by combatants during attacks, or forced recruitment into combat.⁸

Those recruited for combat directly participating in hostilities or engaging in continuous combat functions may be legitimately targeted. While relevant, Additional Protocol II (1977) to the 1949 Geneva Conventions only stipulates ‘special protection’ of children when not engaged in hostilities or should they be captured.⁹ While their recruitment and use in hostilities is prohibited under international law, suppression has proven difficult. Too often, recruitment of minors into armed groups is induced by poverty, a means to supplement weakened family incomes.

Physical isolation and social upheaval are seedbeds for employment of children as not just fighters but also spies, guards, human shields, human minesweepers, servants, decoys and
sentries.¹⁰ Recruitment is further boosted when schools are destroyed or exploited for military purposes. Hence throughout Colombia’s protracted internal conflict, its teachers maintained that: ‘The moment when we stop teaching is the moment when recruitment into the [armed] groups starts.’¹¹ This is frequently invisible, pernicious and ubiquitous. Engaging children as soldiers is also facilitated by the ready availability of relatively inexpensive small arms and light weapons.

Some children in armed conflict locations are more vulnerable than others. A survey invеstigаting thе еxtеnt tо whiсh аrmеd соnfliсts influеnсеd thе hеаlth оutсоmеs оf сhildrеn in 56 dеvеlоping соuntriеs over thrее dесаdеs (1990–2018) found the following: those most vulnerable were more likely to have been born to low educated mothers, live in low income households, suffer inadequate treatment in rural areas and, following displacement, prove more prone to water and vectorborne diseases.¹² For example the bombing of water facilities in Yemen between 2015 and 2018 triggered a cholera outbreak that affected more than half a million, mostly children.

Armed conflict creates environmental hazards that continue to harm children long after hostilities have ended. Landmines and unexploded weapons pose lasting risks of death and disability. Studies from Afghanistan, Eritrea, Laos and Nepal revealed children accounting for approximately half of all injuries caused by explosive remnants of war.¹³ Their plight is worsened by the destruction of health care and public health systems as seen in Gaza.

Arbitrary risks
Locations of armed conflict render children prone to risks of arbitrary displacement and trafficking.  Both are magnified in situations of internationalised internal conflict, such as those that have occurred in the Middle East, the Balkans and North and Central Africa. According to UNICEF, an unprecedented number of children are estimated as either living in conflict zones or forcibly displaced due to conflict and violence. By the end of 2023, 47.2 million children were displaced due to conflict and violence, 2024 trends indicating additional displacement due to intensifying conflicts in Haiti, Lebanon, Myanmar, the state of Palestine and Sudan. Children account for approximately 40 per cent of refugee populations, and 49 per cent of those internally displaced.¹⁴ For UNICEF Director-General Catherine Russell, ‘A child growing up in a conflict zone is far more likely to be out of school, malnourished, or forced from their home — too often repeatedly — compared to a child living in places of peace.’¹⁵

Displaced children join those at risk of trafficking in conflict situations. This includes the sale of abducted children, forced labour, illegal adoption, forced organ donation and various forms of sexual exploitation.¹⁶ This is aggravated not just by displacement, but closure of schools, family separation and weak child protection systems. In his 2023 report on children and armed conflict, the UN secretary-general noted grave violations were verified in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Israel and the state of Palestine, Somalia, the Syrian Arab Republic, Ukraine, Afghanistan and Yemen.¹⁷ Conflict-related trafficking in persons as a form of sexual violence in conflict situations was observed in several countries, including the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Libya, Mozambique, Somalia, South Sudan and Ukraine.¹⁸

While prosecuted at national levels as either a domestic or transnational offences, there is limited acceptance of trafficking as an international crime. Implementation challenges include threats to the safety of investigators in on-going conflicts; inability of state officials and institutions to contribute to or facilitate investigations; lack of documentation for victims or witnesses and lack of trust in investigators. As well, there is failure by legal regimes to address the role of armed non-state actors in trafficking, and on-going impunity for sexual and gender-based violence in conflict locations.¹⁹

Feasible remedies
A primary requirement entails the necessity for armed forces, state and non-state alike, to observe the core tenets of international humanitarian law. For example, in its conduct of hostilities in Gaza, and to the cost of children’s lives, Israel with blatant disregard has violated all key provisions of relevance. They include principles of distinction, of proportionality in the use of force and of feasible precaution during attack to spare civilians and objects from the impact of hostilities. The same applies to Russian force conduct in Ukraine, and fighting units in Sudan. That recent conflict, like numerous others, has highlighted problems of gaining compliance by armed non-state actors. According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, and as of 2023, the number of such entities had almost doubled in the preceding five years. And according to the 2023 report of the UN special representative on children and armed conflict, armed groups were responsible for 50 per cent of grave violations against children.

In response, and created in 2000 by members of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, Geneva Call was established as a humanitarian non-governmental organisation designed to promote respect by armed non-state actors for international humanitarian norms in armed conflict, and in other situations of violence. A decade later, it inaugurated a Deed of Commitment for the Protection of Children designed to enlist support by armed non-state actors. As of 2023, over 30 such entities had signed up to this commitment, although problems persist with inconsistent compliance, changing leaderships and, as in Philippines, financial restraints leading to reductions of local staff.

Deserving attention and circulation, Watchlist performs regular monitoring, reporting and advocacy functions on children and armed conflict. Its affiliates include Geneva Call, Human
Rights Watch and Save the Children. In May 2024, Watchlist published an important policy note on explosive weapons: Children and the Armed Conflict Agenda.²⁰

Such initiatives illustrate a reality of child rights in conflict increasingly being perceived as inseparable from the necessities of ensuring respect for international humanitarian law. Yet while regarded as complementary, most state practice has insisted that these two branches of international law remain distinct and separate. Those positions persist, the deaths of children in armed conflict regarded as regrettable but not illegal. But that assumption cannot ignore a fundamental obligation of ensuring armed forces and armed groups operate under chains of command, accountability for any breach consistently maintained. Frequently those requirements have gone unmet, a standing indictment leaving millions of children dead as a result of armed conflict.

Disaggregated data on short- and long-term child morbidity and mortality attributable to armed conflict remains critical. This includes not only health, but also improved understanding of the financial, economic and social consequences of conflict. Further research is required to understand chronic health needs and trauma effects impacting future livelihoods.²¹ As important as child protection during armed conflict is attention to these needs in post-conflict negotiations towards settlement. Currently lacking is agreed methodology about how to do so, and relevant guidance for mediators.

Some significant court rulings have raised the international salience of children in armed conflict. In 2007, the Special Court for Sierra Leone entered convictions for the crime and use of child soldiers. It followed this court’s 2004 ruling that prohibition on the use of children under the age of fifteen had crystallised as customary international law prior to 1996. That rendered culpable individuals bearing criminal responsibility for such acts. In 2012, the ICC sentenced former Congolese militia leader Thomas Lubanga to fourteen years imprisonment for war crimes that included conscripting and enlisting minors under the age of fifteen for active participation in hostilities. More recently, in 2023 the ICC issued warrants for the arrest of Russian President Vladimir Putin and his commissioner for children’s rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, both on war crimes charges related to the abduction of Ukrainian children.

While necessary, these developments have been insufficient. For more effective prosecution of war crimes against children, international co-operation, stronger legal frameworks and enhanced investigative and prosecutorial capacity are crucial. In its 2023 policy document, the ICC’s Prosecutors Office acknowledged that, historically, justice mechanisms have taken an adult-centric approach to the investigation and prosecution of international crimes, children’s atrocity-related experiences and their role as key stakeholders in the accountability process largely overlooked or ignored. This document further acknowledged that all crimes under the Rome Statute may be committed against children or otherwise affect them in myriad ways. Noted were needs to establish institutional environments facilitating effective investigation and prosecution of crimes against and affecting children, whether through training, external collaboration and effective implementation, monitoring and evaluation measures. And promoting best practice derived from local and international accountability initiatives.²² Considered from another source, Soja Grover sees complexities emanating from undue concentration on age-based child categorisations, this hindering effective accountability mechanisms, and potentially leading to impunity for perpetrators and inadequate justice for victims.²³

In summary, child victims of armed conflict face sharply contrasting futures. Supported by the law, vigorous non-governmental advocacy and regular, dedicated attention by the UN Security Council, one such prospect offers a global constituency determined to end the scourge of child abuse. Another is business as usual: child casualties in armed conflict predictable collateral; brisk recruitment of minors into active combat persisting; poorly trained and ill-disciplined fighting forces still prevalent; and a continuation of the manifold harms inflicted upon children by displacement.

As to whether these contrasts can accommodate reconciliation, two possibilities remain. The first is the palpable damage that child casualties without limit sustain to security objectives.
In the Tactical Directive issued in 2009 by General Stanley McChrystal, commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, he claimed ‘We must avoid the trap of winning tactical victories — but suffering strategic defeats — by causing civilian casualties or excessive damage thus alienating the people.’ There is now ample evidence that excessive civilian casualties, including many children, have seriously sustained lasting damage to foreign and security policy objectives. A further source of reconciliation is more primal but no less important: children killed in war, or damaged by its impacts, convey unavoidable messages of vulnerability, innocence and capacity to evoke pity.

Dr Roderic Alley is a senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, and a former convenor of the New Zealand International Humanitarian Law Committee

NOTES
1. Report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict (2024), UN Doc.A/HRC/58/18.
2. Ibid.
3. European Paediatric Association, ‘Advocating for Children Trapped in the Midst of Armed Conflict’ (2022), p.1.
4. Ibid.
5. UN General Assembly, ‘Impact of armed conflict on children: note by the Secretary-General’, A/51/306, 26 Aug 1996.
6. United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1990), Article 38.
7. International Labour Organisation, Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention 182 (1999), Article 3.
8. Ayesha Kadir and Jeffrey Goldhagen, ‘The Effects of Armed Conflict on Children’, Pediatrics (2018), p.5.
9. Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions, Article 77(2).
10. Fikire Tinsae Birhane, ‘Targeting of Children in Non-International Armed Conflict’, Journal of Conflict and Security Law, vol 26, no 2 (2021), p.378.
11. Elizabeth Dickinson, ‘Lockdowns Produced a New Generation of Child Soldiers’, International Crisis Group (2021), p.1.
12. Kien Le and My Nguyen, ‘The Impacts of Armed Conflict on Children’, Journal of Peace Research, vol 60, no 2 (2023), pp.243–57.
13. Kadir and Goldhagen, op cit.
14. UNICEF Not the New Normal (2024), at: www.unicef.org/moldova/en/press-releases/not-new-normal-2024-one-worst-yearsunicefs-history-children-conflict.
15. Ibid.
16. European Paediatric, op cit., p.290.
17. UN Doc.A/78/172, p.5.
18. Ibid.
19. Report of Special Rapporteur Siobhán Mullally on trafficking in persons, especially women and children, UN Doc.A/78/172, p.3.
20. At: watchlist.org/publications/explosive-weapons-and-the-childrenand-armed-conflict-agenda/.
21. S. Garry and F. Checchi, ‘Armed Conflict and Public Health’, Journal of Public Health, vol 42, no 3 (2019), p.295.
22. The ICC Office of the Prosecutor’s Policy on Children, 2023.
23. Soja Grover, The Persecution of Children as a Crime Against Humanity(Springer, 2021).

Individual copies of the New Zealand International Reviews may be purchased here.