The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, has arranged the release of 3000 children who had served as anti-government fighters under David Yau Yau’s rebel movement in Jonglei State. Yau Yau struck a peace deal with the government immediately after the current conflict brock out in December 2013, triggered by inter-SPLM party dispute.
The UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, has arranged the release of 3000 children who had served as anti-government fighters under David Yau Yau’s rebel movement in Jonglei State. Yau Yau struck a peace deal with the government immediately after the current conflict brock out in December 2013, triggered by inter-SPLM party dispute.
The first batch of 280 children were released Tuesday at Gumuruk village in Jonglei State in what UNICEF calls one of the “largest ever demobilization of children”. The rest of the children are to be released over the coming month, says the UN’s children agency.
Aged between 11 and 17 years, they were recruited by the South Sudan Democratic Army Cobra Faction led by David Yau Yau who led his Murle community in battles against the Lou Nuer tribes in cattle raids and revenge killings.
The released children handed over their weapons and uniforms in a ceremony overseen by the South Sudan National Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration Commission, Yau Yau Cobra faction and the UN.
UNICEF South Sudan Representative Jonathan Veitch said at the ceremony that the children had been forced to do and see things no child should ever experience.
“The release of thousands of children requires a massive response to provide the support and protection these children need to begin rebuilding their lives,” he said.
UNICEF and its partners are said to be supplying the children with health care and other basic necessities such as food, water and clothing as they get ready to be reunited with their families. UNICEF said counseling and other psychological support programmes are being carried out to help reintegrate the children back into their communities.
“The successful reintegration of these children back into their communities depends on a timely, coordinated response to meet their immediate and long-term needs,” Veitch said.
The UN estimates the costs for the reintegration of each child is about $2,330 for two years.
So far UNICEF has received close to $2-million from the IKEA Foundation and is appealing for additional $10 million from other donors.
Meanwhile, the United Nations Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict Leila Zerrougui has welcomed the release of the child soldiers by the South Sudan Democratic Army (SSDA/M) Cobra Faction.
“These children, in some cases as young as 11, were thrown in the middle of a violent conflict and will need months, if not years to recover from what they have been through,”says the UN Representative in a press statement sent to news rooms.
“I personally met David Yau Yau last June in Gumuruk and saw child soldiers associated with his armed group. He recognized that he had children in his ranks and expressed his willingness to work with the United Nations to release them. I am pleased to see that months of relentless advocacy by the UN in South Sudan is finally yielding results,” said Zerrougui.
UNICEF and its partners are now setting up the massive response necessary to provide protection and services to help children from the Cobra Faction go back to their families and rebuild their lives.
South Sudan is one of seven countries concerned by the campaign “Children, Not Soldiers”, which aims to end the recruitment and use of children by governments and other armed forces in conflict by the end of 2016.
During the Zerrougui’s visit to South Sudan last year, the government recommitted itself to the full implementation of its action plan with the UN to end the recruitment and use of children in the Sudan People’s Liberation Army.
(Additional information by Daniel Majack Kuany).
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