Child Soldiers of LTTE Tamil Tigers
2002 Archive

UN Report on Child Soldiers Ignores Worst Offenders
commondreams.org - UNITED NATIONS: November 7, 2002 : Last year the Security Council adopted a resolution asking Annan to compile a first-ever list of governments and non-state armed groups that are using children in war.

But some of the countries with the most severe child soldier problems, such as Myanmar, Colombia and Sri Lanka, are not included in Annan's report, says Casey Kelso, coordinator of the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers. [Full Story]

Sri Lanka: LTTE recruitment drive for child soldiers must stop
Amnesty International: October 11, 2002 : Amnesty International today appealed to the leadership of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) to put an immediate halt to the ongoing recruitment of children as combatants and to return all child soldiers to their families or communities.

"Whether the recruitment is forced or not, children have no role to play in war. The LTTE must live up to its own pledge not to use child soldiers, cease recruitment immediately and return the children to their families," Amnesty International said.

According to international standards and the LTTE's own policy commitments, no children should be recruited, regardless of whether they joined voluntarily or were coerced or forced to do so.

The organization has received disturbing reports of an intensive recruitment drive in areas controlled by the LTTE in the north and east of Sri Lanka. In Batticaloa district, hundreds of people have been recruited over the last month or so in the divisions of Vakarai, Vavunativu, Pattipalai, Porativu, Eravurpattu and Koralaipattu. There have also been reports of intensified recruitment in the Vanni, the area to the south of the Jaffna peninsula largely controlled by the LTTE. Several reports also indicate that many families in the Batticaloa area were coerced with threats into letting their children be recruited. Other families who refused were forced to leave their homes and have now taken shelter with relatives in Batticaloa town.

The total number of children recruited is difficult to establish but it is estimated to be several hundred. The LTTE's recruitment policy is that one person from each family has to do "military service". The age limits reportedly currently applied in Batticaloa district are from 15 to 45. However, Amnesty International has received reports that children as young as 14 have been among those recruited. [Full Story]

Sri Lanka: Despite commitments the LTTE continues to recruit children
child-soldiers.org: July 22, 2002 : In June 2002, the Sri Lanka separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) reassured UNICEF that it would not recruit anyone under the age of 18. According to this recent agreement, UNICEF will maintain a central information system of all confirmed cases of under age recruitment for follow-up during regular discussions with the LTTE (see: Child Labour News Release 1/07/02, citing UNICEF news). Later in June, LTTE Political chief S.P. Thamilselvan told an Amnesty International (AI) delegation that the minimum recruitment age is 18, in compliance Sri Lanka’s adoption of the Optional Protocol (see: Child Labour News Release - 1 July 2002, citing Kyodo News 26/06/02; AI, Sri Lanka: AI proposes new approach to peace process, 29 June 2002; UN Wire 24/06/2002). He stated that the group would no longer recruit children and that all children under 18 had been returned to their parents. However, the visiting delegation reported that AI had continued to receive complaints of under-age recruitment, and placed twenty-six individual cases of children between 13 and 16 years old before the LTTE for clarification. The LTTE promised to investigate the cases and report back to AI (see: Faraza Farook, Colombo, Sunday Times, Child soldiers: Tiger 'no', but AI shows 26, 30/6/2002)

In July 2002 the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) admonished the LTTE for recruiting children, often forcibly, since the February ceasefire (see: Agence France-Press, “Monitors admonish Tamil Tigers over recruitment of child soldiers”, 29/07/02). In their report released at the end of July, the SLMM said they found 55 cases of underage recruitment and 43 cases of abduction. (See: SLMM, Press release: Complaints and violations of the ceasefire agreement as of 31st July”, 15 August 2002) The SLMM is inquiring into another 125 complaints of child recruitment and 116 cases of abduction. In August the LTTE insisted in a meeting with the SLMM that allegations of child conscription were false, but later promised an internal investigation and necessary action. (See: The Times of India, New Delhi, “LTTE guilty of recruiting children: Monitors”, 15 August 2002) [Full Story]

LTTE child recruits escape from training camp
Yahoo News: June 30, 2002 : Colombo, June 30 (IANS) Six young girls fled the clutches of Tamil Tiger guerrillas in Sri Lanka and turned themselves in to police in the east of the island, officials said Sunday.

The girls, aged between 13 and 14 years, said they escaped from a training camp of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) at Sittanday in Batticaloa district on Friday, police said.

The escapees claimed they were among 80 child soldiers being trained for combat. [Full Story]

Child Soldiers - The world body has spoken
The Island: May 18, 2002 : The issue of child soldiers has received world attention these days with the United Nations Security Council condemning the use of child soldiers. The UN Secretary General called for an immediate halt to such practices and for a special measure to protect children and include them, particularly girls, in peace processes. It is of great importance that the world body condemned the use of child soldiers at the highest level and strongly.

In Sri Lanka it is not clear if the Norwegians have included in the MOU signed by the government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE that the LTTE should completely give up the use of Child soldiers, be it at combat or for support service. (The Norwegian backed Save the Children is yet to issue a clear statement on LTTE’s use of child soldiers) Only Amnesty International, UNICEF and the UTHR, ICRC and other organizations now in Sri Lanka have come out strongly against the use of child soldiers by the LTTE. [Full Story]

Amnesty International worried about 13 LTTE child soldiers
Yahoo News: February 15, 2002 : Colombo, Feb 15 (IANS) Human rights watchdog Amnesty International has expressed concern over the fate of 13 children, 16 years and under, who have allegedly been forcibly conscripted by the Tamil Tiger rebels in Sri Lanka.

"Amnesty International is concerned for the safety of the children who are thought to have been recruited as combatants by the armed political group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)," the organisation said in a statement issued Friday.
Amnesty said it had given the details of the children's abduction from the embattled north and east in a letter to the LTTE earlier this month.

Thiyagarajah Suthaharan, 12, and his 13-year-old companions Selvaraji Suthahar and Vellaisamy John told their parents last December that they were going to the playground in Sivapuram in Vavuniya district. But they did not return home. [Full Story]

Fear for Safety/Child soldiers
Amnesty International: February 14, 2002 :
SRI LANKA Duncy Mary (f), aged 15
Sudharshini Tharmalingam (f), aged 12
Gunasekaram Kananayagam (m), aged 16
Kathiresan Ruban (m), aged 16
Ravindran Sanjiv (m), aged 13
Anantharasa Gunaseelan (m), aged 14
Baba Thambirasa (m), aged 12
Mahendran Kapilan (m), aged 16
Mathuraiveeran Selvarasa (m), aged 15
Thiyagarajah Suthaharan (m), aged 12
Selvaraji Suthahar (m), aged 13
Vellaisamy John (m), aged 13
Selvarasa Vishaharan (m), aged 15

Amnesty International is concerned for the safety of the children named above, who are thought to have been recruited as combatants by the armed political group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

Duncy Mary was last seen as she returned from a tuition class near a bus stand in Tannamunai, north of Batticaloa town, eastern Sri Lanka on 11 February. She is a Grade 9 student at St. Joseph school in Tannamunai, where she has reportedly excelled in sports. She is originally from Jaffna, northern Sri Lanka, but together with her family was displaced from there in 1995.

Kathiresan Ruban, Ravindran Sanjiv and Anantharasa Gunaseelan were reportedly among a group of seven boys who were recruited by the LTTE on 2 January at Chettikulam, Vavuniya district. [Full Story]

Sri Lanka child soldiers ending up in coffins
Asian Political News: July 17, 2002 : Two prominent Tamil leaders said Wednesday they are "horrified" by reports of child conscription by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which has been fighting the Sri Lankan government for the past 17 years.

K. Premachandran, leader of the Eelam Peoples Revolutionary Liberation Front, told Kyodo News that after the recent Elephant Pass operation on the Jaffna Peninsula in the country's north, the LTTE leadership had ordered area leaders to recruit 5,000 new fighters within three months.

First the LTTE attempted to recruit young boys and girls by showing them videos, but because the response was not up to expectations they resorted to forcible conscription, Premachandran said.

"We have reliable information that in many instances forcibly taken children who escaped from the LTTE have been abducted again because they could not reach safe areas," Premachandran told Kyodo.

Even the Tamil parents who want to rescue their children from the clutches of the LTTE do not have the chance to do so because they are not allowed into military areas, he said.

Douglas Devananda, leader of the Eelam Peoples Democratic Party, told Kyodo the LTTE's recruitment of children is "ghastly and heartless."
"We are totally and strongly against the LTTE and all its methods. We have often said this openly. It is ghastly for the LTTE to conscript young boys and even girls," he said.

"The 'baby brigade' is one of those inconceivable horrors of history," Devananda said, adding that according to latest reports, the LTTE was abducting children at gun point and loading them onto trucks while "parents run wailing behind." the vehicles.

Both men were responding a report Tuesday by the Jaffna branch of the University Teachers for Human Rights (UTHR) that delineated the LTTE recruitment of children.

The UTHR, in the 18-page report, said nine out of 15 children who were recruited from a school in just one rebel-held town have been killed already, underscoring the high mortality rate among child warriors.

Still, the LTTE is increasingly forcing boys and girls as young as 10 years to become soldiers, the group said.

"Unlike in the earlier phases of fighting where small arms played a dominant role, most of the young being killed on the LTTE side are now brought home in sealed coffins as their bodies were mutilated by shelling," the UTHR said. [Full Story]