Young Victims of a Senseless War - In
Battle for a Cause Unclear
by Sama Duthiya
Tamil children from poor families in the North and East of
Sri Lanka are sacrificial pawns in a terrorist war financed and
waged by extremist Tamils in the West who refuse to negotiate for
peace....says M. Devadasan in the cover story of the
Outlook magazine appropriately entitled: Children of
War. The article (Outlook: Winter 1997/98) describes how
young children are wooed by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(LTTE) with Rambo-style movies and stories of young martyrs and
play areas full of toy guns mounted on see-saws. The author
vividly describes how Tamil families in the North and East are
menaced with property confiscation or physical violence if they
appeared unwilling to contribute their sons for the cause.
Reports indicate that the LTTE now has more than 1200 enlisted
child soldiers under the age of 14 bearing arms for the
Cause at any given time. These children are recruited
sometimes by the use of money, but more often by the use of sheer
terror tactics. The families and the children are told the young
recruits would be trained to hold high office in the LTTE
military command, but more often than not, they are used merely
as cannon fodder, to take the fire in the frontline
of battle. John F. Burns of the New York Times in a recent
article syndicated by the New York Times writes how the LTTE hard
core draws back when attacked, leaving the child soldiers to die
out in the front, screaming for their mothers in the night. The
report describes how the child soldiers often forget to swallow
the cyanide capsules strung around their necks and die anguished
deaths, taking the fire meant for their comrades in arms. All
this sacrifice, for a cause that they hardly
understand!
The LTTEs recruitment of young Tamil children in the
relentless pursuit of their megalomaniacal ambitions,
demonstrates just how selfish, heartless and ruthless they are.
No genuine freedom fighter would stoop so low, be so cowardly as
to allow young children to serve as fodder for the cannon
intended for them. The killing of innocent people in ruthless
acts of ethnic cleansing, the terrorizing of whole communities,
the displacement of people leaving them homeless and landless -
these are all cowardly acts. But the calculated decision to
enlist young children of their own community to die in the
frontlines of a senseless war is the most cowardly act of all. It
is a decision that should be shunned by the international
community. It is a crime for which the perpetrators should be
held accountable and brought to justice by the international
community - for the violation of the rights of those who are not
of an age to take decisions for themselves.