Child Soldiers

In class we watched an interview on Ishmael Beah. He was a child soldier. What he described was horrifying and shocking. I think no child should have to go through this. I cannot believe that there is 300, 000 child soldiers today. I think Canadian children, parents, students, teachers, and citizens should be aware about this situation and it is going on right now. I did not know about child soldiers before I watched this video, so we need to let people know that this is happening in the world today. Being a soldier at any age can be terrifying. Going to war and killing another person is disturbing at any age. Combatants in Canada can suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and they are adults, not children, they are 18 years old or older. I could not image how children could deal with the impacted of going in a war situation and having to kill people. How are they supposed to handle that emotionally when some adults have trouble with that concept? Children do not handle difficult situations as well as adults generally, so being in a war situation would be awful for young children! This link: http://www.peacedirect.org/bring-the-children-back/ is a site that talks about a peacebuilder Henri Ladyi who tries to liberate child soldiers. The site has a documentary on it focusing on the release of several dozen young soldiers, and follows Henri as he travels deep into the bush to meet with hardened rebel leaders. The site also gives information on how people can donate and help Henri Ladyi bring child soldiers home.

These are two pictures of young child soldiers. This is devastating to me to see these young child holding guns. Children are supposed to be innocent and seeing them hold guns is disturbing to me.