In recent weeks hundreds of young men and boys from the Dadaab refugee camps have been secretly recruited for the force, lured with false promises of lavish pay and claims of backing from the United Nations and the United States.
The Kenyan government should immediately stop the recruitment of Somalis in refugee camps to fight for an armed force in Somalia. Kenyan authorities have directly supported the drive, which has recruited hundreds of Somali men and boys in the sprawling Dadaab refugee camps as well as Kenyan citizens from nearby towns.
The former Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano will give his final briefing to the United Nations Security Council on July 15 in his role as the secretary-general's special envoy for the areas of east and central Africa affected by the Lord's Resistance Army and their two-decade campaign of violence. Although Chissano's mandate was suspended as of June 30, abuses by the LRA - ruthless rebels whose actions have had a devastating effect on civilians in four countries - continue.
The United Nations Security Council should impose sanctions on governments and armed groups for using child soldiers, sexual violence against children, and attacks on schools, and should promote effective prosecution of the commanders responsible.
The US Department of Justice should expedite the review and provide education and other rehabilitation assistance for five detainees at Guantanamo who have been held there since they were children. The detainees were brought to Guantanamo between the ages of 15 and 17, and have now been in detention there for more than six years.
The United Nations Security Council should act with urgency to send additional peacekeepers to northern Democratic Republic of Congo, where the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) continues its brutal attacks on civilians.
Former child soldiers and other youth representing a grassroots campaign from around the world will present thousands of symbolic "red hands" to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today to demand stronger action by international leaders to end the use of child soldiers.
The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo should urgently carry out new recommendations from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to protect children from violence and abuse.
The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo should arrest Bosco Ntaganda, a former rebel commander charged with war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC), Human Rights Watch said today in a public letter to President Joseph Kabila.
The Orissa state government in India should develop and put into effect measures to ensure that children are not recruited as "special police officers."
