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FNL Child Soldiers

At least sixty-five children—and likely dozens more—said to be FNL combatants or supporters of the FNL are in government custody.¹³ Like the adults, some deserted the FNL and turned themselves over to government soldiers or police in the hope of returning eventually to civilian life. Others were captured by government soldiers in the course of military operations or were arrested by police officers during searches for FNL combatants.¹⁴ Like the adults, the children fall into two groups that are treated differently by the government. Some twenty-five are treated as combatants and housed at Randa, while at least forty others are detained in prisons on charges of participation in armed groups.¹⁵ There is no apparent explanation for why children end up in one group rather than the other, except perhaps that those detained by the police were more likely to end up in prison.

Conditions at Randa are difficult, but those in prisons are far worse than at the welcome center. In addition, children at the demobilization site have the expectation of being sent home with a package of benefits while children in prison expect at best to be released and at worst to spend more time in prison.

On at least one occasion in the past, the government released children who admitted or who were accused of being FNL combatants. During an earlier round of peace negotiations in May 2005, a significant number of children joined the FNL, some of them certainly attracted by the apparent imminence of a ceasefire and the hope of participating in a demobilization program with its expected benefits. By late June 2005, the government had about one hundred of these minors in its custody. After keeping the children in the military camp of Muzinda for a few weeks, it sent them home.¹⁶ Given that there was no demobilization program at the time, the children received no money or other benefits from the government.

Currently, there may be hundreds of other children active in the ranks of the FNL who will eventually need demobilization and reintegration. Representatives of the United Nations Operations in Burundi (ONUB), the partners of the government’s demobilization program and the World Bank recently urged the Burundian government to clarify the status of FNL child combatants so that the partners may plan for the provision of future assistance to these children.¹⁷

Use of Children as Informants before Prospective Demobilization

Government soldiers and police regularly use admitted or suspected FNL combatants, including those who are children, to assist in finding and identifying members of the FNL force and its supporters.¹⁸ Some receive a small compensation in food, drink, or money for their help. A seventeen-year-old boy from Mpanda commune, Bubanza province, now at Randa, had joined the FNL when he was eleven years old but surrendered to soldiers at a military position in Nyabiraba commune, Bujumbura-rural province, in late 2005 because he had heard that soldiers from other rebel forces had been demobilized. He spent five months at the Nyabiraba post, going out regularly with government soldiers to look for FNL combatants and supporters. He was sixteen years old at the time. He told a Human Rights Watch researcher:

I would work, showing the government soldiers where the FNL were hiding out and then they would trap them. Sometimes, the FNL were killed and sometimes they were just arrested and taken back to the military camp. I never carried a weapon when I was with the government soldiers but I did transport bullets and bombs sometimes. In exchange, I got money and food.¹⁹

Given that they are in government custody, captured or detained, children are in no position to refuse an order to provide such assistance.