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NEWS STORY
By Katy Pownall August 25, 2007 Kampala, Uganda - At 12, Lucy Aol was clutching an assault rifle and preparing to ambush government soldiers. At 13, a rebel commander a decade older made her his wife. At 16, she was a mother. At 21, fresh-faced and beaming in a clean T-shirt and neatly braided hair, Aol is studying environmental health at college in Uganda's capital, and planning to use her knowledge to improve the health of her war-battered nation. Aol has made a remarkable journey from child soldier to young woman with a future, but millions of children across Africa continue to be victims of war - orphaned, forced from their homes, denied education and, like Aol, forced to fight in the conflicts waged by their elders. But slowly, the world's campaign against the horror of child soldiery, and its pursuit of the perpetrators as war criminals, has begun to yield results. Girls are an estimated 30 percent of the young fighters. They face challenges boys don't, such as rape and the stigma it inflicts, making it harder for girls to return to their communities. Aol was 12 when she was abducted by a feared Ugandan rebel group, forced to walk hundreds of miles to a base in neighboring southern Sudan and taught to use a gun. "We were used like slaves," Aol said, staring at the wall of the cramped student dormitory at Kampala's Mulago Medical College. "We used to work in the fields or collect firewood from 7 in the morning until 5 in the evening and we were given no food. If you made a mistake or refused, they would beat us ... the three girls who were taken from my village with me were beaten to death." "We were always moving with our guns but when you are so young they are very heavy and difficult to carry," she said. Aol was snatched by the Lord's Resistance Army, rebels based in northern Uganda who are estimated to have abducted 25,000 children during their 20-year anti-government insurgency. Peace talks are under way, but pleas to free the children meet with denials they are being coerced into soldiery. According to Human Rights Watch, child soldiers play various roles, including spies, porters, mine sweepers, concubines as well as active combatants, often serving on front lines and sustaining some of Africa's bloodiest and longest running conflicts. The number of child soldiers - defined in international law as children under 18 - cannot be estimated, humanitarian groups say. And though most are forcibly recruited, many join out of desperation. For those separated from their families or orphaned, enlistment may be the only way to get shelter, food and companionship. Children are easily manipulated and can be groomed from an early age to obey instructions unquestioningly. Child protection workers cite numerous tactics used by ruthless commanders to coerce their young captives into obedience. In Sierra Leone, child soldiers were given a cocktail of gunpowder and cocaine before battle. In Liberia, they were forced to do things that would isolate them permanently from the community such as murdering family members. Returnees from the Lord's Resistance Army, a cult-like group with only the vaguest of political platforms, tell of oil being smeared on young fighters to make them believe they are bulletproof. "I went only once to the field to fight," Aol said. "We laid an ambush for the government soldiers and waited. But after three days they hadn't come so we were sent back and a second group came to take our place. The soldiers came and there was fighting. They killed 16 LRA. All were children and some were my friends." Aol said most of the LRA fighters at her base were aged 10 to 15. "You get trained in guns for one or two weeks, then you are sent to a battle but most don't know how to fight so they are killed," she said. "I felt sad because young people like me die not for something they believe in but because they are forced to fight. The rebels tell you, 'Don't surrender - don't run," or they will kill you." At 13 Aol was made the third wife of an LRA commander. She says she suffered "sexual abuse" and was regularly beaten by her older co-wives. She considered suicide. Three years into her ordeal, Aol decided to escape. She managed to persuade her rebel "husband" that a better life awaited them back home. One morning, fearing for their lives, they fled Sudan. It took them three weeks to reach Uganda. Once there, they were ambushed by government soldiers. Aol was captured and her husband, the commander, was shot dead. She was taken to a center for former combatants where she received some counseling and learned that she was pregnant. She gave birth to her daughter, Winifred Bianca, four months later. Returning to normal life was tough. She had no money to continue her schooling, and although her family welcomed her home, her neighbors - whose daughter had been killed by the rebels - were less accepting. "They asked why am I alive and their daughter is not. They said that I've killed people and that I might kill my parents," she said. The young mothers find their babies ostracized as "Kony's children," referring to Joseph Kony, the self-proclaimed prophet who leads the Lord's Resistance Army. "People say we have ghosts attached to us because we have killed ... they point at us and talk badly about us," Aol said. Returning girl soldiers have it tougher, according to Susan McKay, a professor of Women's and International Studies at Wyoming University who has studied the subject. "Girls who return to communities are perceived to have more thoroughly violated social norms than boys," she said. "They find it hard to marry and their children are often stigmatized." Poverty drives many to prostitution, she said, and even back into the ranks of the rebel armies they escaped. Peace agreements in recent years, including those of Sudan, Ivory Coast and Burundi, have included a framework for returning children to society. Radhika Coomaraswamy, the U.N.'s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, hopes to see standard paragraphs on child protection in all agreements ending wars where children fought. Though she emphasizes that much work remains to be done, Coomaraswamy believes the world has made significant steps. Over 100 countries have ratified a U.N. treaty banning the conscription of children, and a working group that reports directly to the U.N. Security Council on situations involving child soldiers has had successes. Among them was the decision by rebels in Ivory Coast to enter into dialogue with U.N. teams and accept a plan to release children. The law has also had results. On June 20, the U.N.-backed court trying crimes committed in Sierra Leone's civil war convicted three former junta leaders of using child soldiers - the first verdict of its kind, according to Corinne Dufka of Human Rights Watch. They were sentenced to prison terms of 45 to 50 years each. The International Criminal Court treats the recruitment of children under 15 into armed forces as a war crime. The first case before the Hague-based court, beginning later this year, is that of a former militia leader from Congo, Thomas Lubanga, and it focuses on his use of child soldiers. The Lubanga case is already acting as a deterrent in Africa, Coomaraswamy said. Many analysts believe the decision by the Lord's Resistance Army to enter into peace negotiations last year was forced by the indictment of its top five leaders, including Kony, on counts including forcible enlistment of and use of child soldiers. The LRA is not believed to have abducted any children since the peace talks produced a cease-fire in August. Meanwhile, Lucy Aol is now a bright and talkative 21-year old. With help from her mother, a small inheritance from her father - who died last year - and her own hard work and determination, she saved enough money to enroll at Mulago Medical College, based at Uganda's most prestigious hospital. Her daughter, now 5, is cared for by her mother while she studies. "There is no money to send Winifred to school while I am studying so she has to wait. I have one more year, then I can get a job and she will go to school," Aol said, beaming. "I want my daughter to have all the opportunities I never had. Her education is very important to me. I think she might be a lawyer." Aol shakes her head and smiles when asked if she ever imagined a happy ending while she was with the rebels. "Now, when I look at myself, I see a completely different person to who was there in the bush," she said. "My daughter and I have a future in spite of all that has happened."
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