In March, the State Department published its annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. These Human Rights Reports provide valuable and well-sourced information concerning individual, civil, political, and worker rights violations; conflict-related abuses; and other human rights issues in countries around the world. Often missing from the headlines, however, are the insights these annual reports can provide on governments’ child soldier practices. This year’s Human Rights Reports are valuable not only for illustrating the extent to which the recruitment and use of child soldiers remains an enormous global challenge, but also for offering a roadmap for how the Biden administration can strengthen U.S. child soldier prevention efforts in the months ahead.
For a compilation of key child soldier-related language excerpted from these reports, see: 2022 Human Rights Reports: Insights Into Global Child Soldier Recruitment and Use.
Countries Complicit in Child Soldier Recruitment or Use
According to the 2022 Human Rights Reports and the sources they cite, there were credible reports of at least 17 governments recruiting or using child soldiers in the 2022 calendar year or supporting armed groups that did so:
- Afghanistan
- Burma (Myanmar)
- Central African Republic
- Democratic Republic of the Congo
- Eritrea
- Ethiopia
- Iran
- Mali
- Russia
- Somalia
- South Sudan
- Syria
- Turkey
- United Arab Emirates
- Venezuela
- Yemen
- Saudi Arabia
Most of these governments have previously been implicated by the State Department in the recruitment or use of child soldiers. Since 2010, a U.S. law known as the Child Soldiers Prevention Act (CSPA) has required the Secretary of State to include in the State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report a list of governments which, during the previous year, recruited or used child soldiers or supported armed groups that did so. Of the 17 countries listed above, 13 have previously appeared in at least one of these annual lists (commonly referred to as the “CSPA list”). While some have been listed relatively infrequently (Russia and Turkey, for example, have only been listed once) others have remained on the list for over a decade (including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, and Yemen), illustrating the enduring and deep-seated nature of the problem at hand.
The Human Rights Reports also contain details on the recruitment or use of child soldiers by, or supported by, four governments that the State Department has yet to include on a CSPA list (Eritrea, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia).
- The report for Eritrea references a May 2022 report from the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Eritrea, in which the Special Rapporteur describes having “received information from multiple and credible sources regarding the deployment of Eritrean children in military combat in Tigray,” Ethiopia. In its report, the State Department stops short of indicating whether Eritrea was responsible for the recruitment or use of these children in combat. However, the UN report it references strongly suggests that Eritrea was, in fact, responsible. In it, the Special Rapporteur describes “a worsening in previously documented patterns of forced conscription of children” by Eritrean authorities and recommends that the Eritrean government “[i]nvestigate the recruitment of children by the Eritrean armed forces to fight in Tigray and take the necessary steps to prevent the conscription and deployment of child soldiers.”
- Ethiopian government forces were reported to have unlawfully recruited and used child soldiers in 2022, according to the State Department’s Human Rights Report for Ethiopia. The State Department cites an October 2022 media report, which claims the government of Ethiopia “forcibly recruited child soldiers from southern Oromia to fight against the [Tigray People’s Liberation Front]. The government repeatedly denied the allegations of forced recruitment, maintaining youth of legal age joined security forces voluntarily.”
- Child soldiers are not mentioned in the Human Rights Reports for either Saudi Arabia or the United Arab Emirates. However, according to the Yemen report, “All parties to the conflict [in Yemen] were implicated in child soldier recruitment and use,” including “UAE-backed STC, Giant Brigades” and “Saudi-led coalition forces.”
A Roadmap for U.S. Child Soldier Prevention Efforts
The insights into governments’ child soldier practices that the Human Rights Reports provide can greatly enhance U.S. child soldier prevention efforts by supporting the Biden administration’s development of the 2023 CSPA list. The list, expected to be released in June of this year, will identify governments that the Secretary of State determines recruited or used child soldiers, or supported armed groups that did so, between April 1, 2022 and March 31, 2023.
The list is far from a simple naming-and-shaming exercise. Rather, it is an integral part of a powerful but woefully underutilized U.S. tool to prevent the global recruitment and use of child soldiers. Under the CSPA, governments included on this list in a given year are prohibited from receiving certain types of U.S. arms sales and military assistance the following fiscal year, absent a presidential waiver or other exception. If well implemented, the CSPA could serve as a potent incentive for governments implicated in child soldier recruitment or use to put an end to these practices in exchange for gaining access to highly sought-after U.S. weapons, equipment, and training.
Unfortunately, the law’s potential has been undercut by successive U.S. administrations, beginning with the Obama administration’s release of the first-ever CSPA list in 2010. In the years since, presidents have made extensive use of their authority to waive the law’s prohibitions, which has allowed 97 percent of the arms and assistance subject to the law’s restrictions to flow to governments complicit in child soldiers recruitment or use. However, a more fundamental issue has been that governments widely reported to recruit or use child soldiers have repeatedly been left out of the annual CSPA list, eliminating any prospect of the law being used to leverage a change in their behavior. To take just one recent example, the Philippines was not included in last year’s CSPA list, even though – according to the State Department – “the U.S. Government determined that the Philippines had or used child soldiers” during the reporting period for last year’s CSPA list.
The State Department’s Human Rights Reports can help ensure that CSPA lists are as comprehensive as possible. The processes and reporting periods used by the State Department to develop the Human Rights Reports differ from those used to develop the Trafficking in Persons Report, as well as the CSPA list contained within it. As a result, it may not always be the case that child soldiers-related information captured in the Human Rights Reports will be reflected in the Trafficking in Persons Report or CSPA list. However, the breadth of reporting used to compile the Human Rights Reports and their focus on government and non-state abuses alike – unlike the Trafficking in Persons Report, which focuses on government anti-trafficking efforts – allows them to provide a holistic and comprehensive picture of child soldier recruitment and use with a given country, which can be enormously helpful in identifying governments that merit inclusion on the CSPA list.
Next Steps for the Biden Administration
If the Biden administration is serious about ending the recruitment and use of child soldiers worldwide, it should seek to maximize the CSPA’s impact by ensuring that the forthcoming CSPA list provides a comprehensive account of the governments implicated in child soldier recruitment or use during the previous year. The Human Rights Reports implicate 17 governments in the recruitment or use of child soldiers in 2022, though it is unclear based on the reports themselves whether all 17 committed or supported these acts on or after April 1, 2022, which is the beginning of the reporting period for the 2023 CSPA list. To the extent they did, all 17 should be included in this year’s CSPA list, which would subject them to U.S. arms sales and military assistance prohibitions in FY2024.
However, it is not a foregone conclusion that the Biden administration will include all 17 of these governments in its 2023 CSPA list, even if the State Department determines they were complicit in child soldier recruitment or use during the reporting report. The U.S. counts many of these governments as close and long-standing security partners and may therefore be reluctant to invite criticism of their child soldier practices or risk denying them access to U.S. weapons and training.
Indeed, some of the governments implicated in the recruitment or use of child soldiers in the 2022 Human Rights Reports appear to have been shielded by similar politico-strategic considerations in recent years. In 2019, amid widespread reports of Saudi Arabia’s use of child soldiers in Yemen, the Trump administration chose not to include Saudi Arabia in that year’s CSPA list over the objections of State Department experts. And after Turkey protested its inclusion in the 2021 CSPA list over its support for armed groups in Syria that recruited child soldiers, the Biden administration chose not to include Turkey in the 2022 CSPA list – despite the State Department acknowledging at the time that Turkey was reportedly still supporting groups engaged in child soldier recruitment in Syria.
Conversely, one of these 17 governments – Afghanistan – may be excluded from this year’s CSPA list because of the political legitimacy their listing could confer. Afghanistan has appeared on every CSPA list since 2019 and child soldier recruitment and use by the de facto Taliban government and other actors remains rampant. However, to include Afghanistan in this year’s CSPA list would require a determination that its “governmental […] forces” or “government-supported armed groups” recruited or used child soldiers between April 1, 2022 and March 31, 2023, a period of time during which the only conceivable government of Afghanistan was the Taliban. Given that “[t]he United States has not decided whether to recognize the Taliban or any other entity as the government of Afghanistan,” the Biden administration may be inclined to omit the country from this year’s list over concerns that including it would represent a tacit recognition of the Taliban government.
Despite these very real challenges, if the Biden administration is committed to combatting the scourge of child soldier recruitment and use, it is imperative that its forthcoming 2023 CSPA list be as comprehensive as possible and include, at a minimum, all 17 governments implicated in these practices in the 2022 Human Rights Reports. Doing otherwise would not only limit the potential impact of the CSPA and weaken U.S. child soldier prevention efforts but would also put the administration in the uncomfortable position of being out of step with – and risk undermining the credibility of – its flagship human rights reporting tool. Navigating the perceived political or strategic barriers to comprehensive CSPA implementation may be challenging, but they are challenges that must be overcome given the scope and severity of global child soldier recruitment and use.
Photo: A child soldier in Yambio, South Sudan. UNMISS/Isaac Billy.
2022 Human Rights Reports: What They Mean for Biden’s Child Soldier Prevention Efforts
By Ryan Fletcher
Conventional Arms
In March, the State Department published its annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. These Human Rights Reports provide valuable and well-sourced information concerning individual, civil, political, and worker rights violations; conflict-related abuses; and other human rights issues in countries around the world. Often missing from the headlines, however, are the insights these annual reports can provide on governments’ child soldier practices. This year’s Human Rights Reports are valuable not only for illustrating the extent to which the recruitment and use of child soldiers remains an enormous global challenge, but also for offering a roadmap for how the Biden administration can strengthen U.S. child soldier prevention efforts in the months ahead.
For a compilation of key child soldier-related language excerpted from these reports, see: 2022 Human Rights Reports: Insights Into Global Child Soldier Recruitment and Use.
Countries Complicit in Child Soldier Recruitment or Use
According to the 2022 Human Rights Reports and the sources they cite, there were credible reports of at least 17 governments recruiting or using child soldiers in the 2022 calendar year or supporting armed groups that did so:
Most of these governments have previously been implicated by the State Department in the recruitment or use of child soldiers. Since 2010, a U.S. law known as the Child Soldiers Prevention Act (CSPA) has required the Secretary of State to include in the State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report a list of governments which, during the previous year, recruited or used child soldiers or supported armed groups that did so. Of the 17 countries listed above, 13 have previously appeared in at least one of these annual lists (commonly referred to as the “CSPA list”). While some have been listed relatively infrequently (Russia and Turkey, for example, have only been listed once) others have remained on the list for over a decade (including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, and Yemen), illustrating the enduring and deep-seated nature of the problem at hand.
The Human Rights Reports also contain details on the recruitment or use of child soldiers by, or supported by, four governments that the State Department has yet to include on a CSPA list (Eritrea, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia).
A Roadmap for U.S. Child Soldier Prevention Efforts
The insights into governments’ child soldier practices that the Human Rights Reports provide can greatly enhance U.S. child soldier prevention efforts by supporting the Biden administration’s development of the 2023 CSPA list. The list, expected to be released in June of this year, will identify governments that the Secretary of State determines recruited or used child soldiers, or supported armed groups that did so, between April 1, 2022 and March 31, 2023.
The list is far from a simple naming-and-shaming exercise. Rather, it is an integral part of a powerful but woefully underutilized U.S. tool to prevent the global recruitment and use of child soldiers. Under the CSPA, governments included on this list in a given year are prohibited from receiving certain types of U.S. arms sales and military assistance the following fiscal year, absent a presidential waiver or other exception. If well implemented, the CSPA could serve as a potent incentive for governments implicated in child soldier recruitment or use to put an end to these practices in exchange for gaining access to highly sought-after U.S. weapons, equipment, and training.
Unfortunately, the law’s potential has been undercut by successive U.S. administrations, beginning with the Obama administration’s release of the first-ever CSPA list in 2010. In the years since, presidents have made extensive use of their authority to waive the law’s prohibitions, which has allowed 97 percent of the arms and assistance subject to the law’s restrictions to flow to governments complicit in child soldiers recruitment or use. However, a more fundamental issue has been that governments widely reported to recruit or use child soldiers have repeatedly been left out of the annual CSPA list, eliminating any prospect of the law being used to leverage a change in their behavior. To take just one recent example, the Philippines was not included in last year’s CSPA list, even though – according to the State Department – “the U.S. Government determined that the Philippines had or used child soldiers” during the reporting period for last year’s CSPA list.
The State Department’s Human Rights Reports can help ensure that CSPA lists are as comprehensive as possible. The processes and reporting periods used by the State Department to develop the Human Rights Reports differ from those used to develop the Trafficking in Persons Report, as well as the CSPA list contained within it. As a result, it may not always be the case that child soldiers-related information captured in the Human Rights Reports will be reflected in the Trafficking in Persons Report or CSPA list. However, the breadth of reporting used to compile the Human Rights Reports and their focus on government and non-state abuses alike – unlike the Trafficking in Persons Report, which focuses on government anti-trafficking efforts – allows them to provide a holistic and comprehensive picture of child soldier recruitment and use with a given country, which can be enormously helpful in identifying governments that merit inclusion on the CSPA list.
Next Steps for the Biden Administration
If the Biden administration is serious about ending the recruitment and use of child soldiers worldwide, it should seek to maximize the CSPA’s impact by ensuring that the forthcoming CSPA list provides a comprehensive account of the governments implicated in child soldier recruitment or use during the previous year. The Human Rights Reports implicate 17 governments in the recruitment or use of child soldiers in 2022, though it is unclear based on the reports themselves whether all 17 committed or supported these acts on or after April 1, 2022, which is the beginning of the reporting period for the 2023 CSPA list. To the extent they did, all 17 should be included in this year’s CSPA list, which would subject them to U.S. arms sales and military assistance prohibitions in FY2024.
However, it is not a foregone conclusion that the Biden administration will include all 17 of these governments in its 2023 CSPA list, even if the State Department determines they were complicit in child soldier recruitment or use during the reporting report. The U.S. counts many of these governments as close and long-standing security partners and may therefore be reluctant to invite criticism of their child soldier practices or risk denying them access to U.S. weapons and training.
Indeed, some of the governments implicated in the recruitment or use of child soldiers in the 2022 Human Rights Reports appear to have been shielded by similar politico-strategic considerations in recent years. In 2019, amid widespread reports of Saudi Arabia’s use of child soldiers in Yemen, the Trump administration chose not to include Saudi Arabia in that year’s CSPA list over the objections of State Department experts. And after Turkey protested its inclusion in the 2021 CSPA list over its support for armed groups in Syria that recruited child soldiers, the Biden administration chose not to include Turkey in the 2022 CSPA list – despite the State Department acknowledging at the time that Turkey was reportedly still supporting groups engaged in child soldier recruitment in Syria.
Conversely, one of these 17 governments – Afghanistan – may be excluded from this year’s CSPA list because of the political legitimacy their listing could confer. Afghanistan has appeared on every CSPA list since 2019 and child soldier recruitment and use by the de facto Taliban government and other actors remains rampant. However, to include Afghanistan in this year’s CSPA list would require a determination that its “governmental […] forces” or “government-supported armed groups” recruited or used child soldiers between April 1, 2022 and March 31, 2023, a period of time during which the only conceivable government of Afghanistan was the Taliban. Given that “[t]he United States has not decided whether to recognize the Taliban or any other entity as the government of Afghanistan,” the Biden administration may be inclined to omit the country from this year’s list over concerns that including it would represent a tacit recognition of the Taliban government.
Despite these very real challenges, if the Biden administration is committed to combatting the scourge of child soldier recruitment and use, it is imperative that its forthcoming 2023 CSPA list be as comprehensive as possible and include, at a minimum, all 17 governments implicated in these practices in the 2022 Human Rights Reports. Doing otherwise would not only limit the potential impact of the CSPA and weaken U.S. child soldier prevention efforts but would also put the administration in the uncomfortable position of being out of step with – and risk undermining the credibility of – its flagship human rights reporting tool. Navigating the perceived political or strategic barriers to comprehensive CSPA implementation may be challenging, but they are challenges that must be overcome given the scope and severity of global child soldier recruitment and use.
Photo: A child soldier in Yambio, South Sudan. UNMISS/Isaac Billy.
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