God...this is horrible. Is there something we can do?

@Dennis G.: I've heard of that, too and it's just about one of the most awful thing humans can do to each other.

=(

This is disgusting.

This is horrifying and absolutely disgusting!

I have a little girl... and I can not imagine.

Thnx for posting this, I had no idea.

While agreeing Child Soldiers should not be acceptable in any terms, need to bring few HERE.

b. According to the reliable reports, Tigers recruited child solders and they agreed. As per US State Departement latest release, Tigers initiated controls to identify and release them. They already release thousands to UNICEF (I will attach a separate US State Department report in another note)

c. MOST STAGGERING part is the Recruitment of Child Soldiers by Sri Lankan Government Forces and its Para-military. There are ample evidences produced by Human Rights Watch, Local Human Rights reports, highly published news media. As a result, HRW Reported Sri Lankan Governments involved in the use of children as soldiers may no longer be eligible for US military assistance under legislation adopted by the US Congress on December 10, 2008. Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Chad, Congo Sudan, and Uganda are expected to be affected by the new legislation passed unanimously by both the Senate and the House

4. The difference between these two different recruitments (both have to be criticised) - Mostly Sri Lankan Government atrocities and genocide forces the children to take up arms. But in Government Recruitement, since no one wants to join Government paramilitary which kills Tamils, they force them to take up arms in broader analytical context. 


 - Mike

Here is the extract of  ‘Child Soldiers' section of the State Department's Country Report on Human Rights for Sri Lanka follows:

"Both the LTTE and the Karuna group (also known as TMVP, or Pillaiyan group) used minors in battle. The Karuna group and the LTTE also continued to recruit child soldiers forcibly, while intimidating and using violence against civilians.

"The LTTE instituted a "one family, one fighter" policy, forcing each family to provide at least one member, including children, to the LTTE. By year's end most sources indicated that the "one family, one fighter" policy targeted those 18 years or older. The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) noted a significant reduction in reported child recruitment by the LTTE. While the trend indicated that the LTTE was eliminating the recruitment and use of child soldiers, it had not complied with the promise to end the use of all minors by year's end. UNICEF reported that the LTTE forcibly recruited (or rerecruited) 160 children during the year with an average age of 16 years. At year's end 205 children remained in LTTE custody, including 1,224 who were recruited as children but were over 18 at year's end.

"According to UN sources, there was limited progress during the year in the release of children recruited by both groups. A UNICEF supported action plan sought to rehabilitate former LTTE child soldiers through release and reintegration. Under this program there were to be three UNICEF-supported transit centers. Two of the transit centers, in Batticaloa and Trincomalee, never opened because of a lack of releases by the LTTE. By mid-year the LTTE no longer controlled these areas. UNICEF supported the establishment of a transit center in Kilinochchi for child recruits released by the LTTE, which remained open, but UNICEF noted that its use was limited and declining.

"The Karuna group continued to recruit children, some forcibly after abduction. Karuna cadres used coercion, extortion, rape, and murder to force children and adults to join their ranks. Karuna operatives often bribed parents to allow their children to join the Karuna group, and punished parents or children if they resisted.

‘Unlike the LTTE, UNICEF statistics indicated that child recruitment by the pro-government Karuna group did not decline. The UN Special Rapporteur (UNSR) on Children and Armed Conflict reported and cited evidence that government forces were at times complicit in the recruitment of children. During the year, UNICEF reported that the Karuna group recruited and rerecruited children for use as child soldiers, especially in Batticaloa district for a total of 251. This was more than in 2006, although the rate of recruitment was down from its peak in late 2005. Some previously recruited child soldiers reached 18 years of age while continuing to serve in the Karuna group. UNICEF figures show that at the end of the year, 160 children were still serving in the Karuna forces, and 69 who were recruited as children were now over age 18."

You quoted "Sri Lankan Army" to criticise Tigers. See the latest Report from UNICEF EXECUTIVE What Sri Lanka and its Military doing against their own citizens and CHILDREN - A Brutal Genocide.

PLEASE CORRECT YOUR REPORT WITH BALANCED REPORTING TO REFLECT THIS BRUTALITY.

Statement by UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman on the situation in Sri Lanka

17 March 2009

"Children and their families caught in the conflict zone are at risk of dying from disease and malnutrition."

"Regular, safe access for humanitarian agencies is urgently required, so that lifesaving supplies can be provided, and civilians must be allowed to move to safe areas where essential humanitarian support is more readily available."

"The rights of children caught in the conflict must be fully respected and every effort should be taken to prevent civilian casualties."

"UNICEF, together with other UN agencies and partners, is providing emergency water and sanitation, health, nutrition, protection and education support for many of the 40,000 people who have been able to leave the conflict zone."

"Children are the innocent victims of Sri Lanka's conflict. They desperately need assistance and extraordinary efforts must be taken to protect them."
http://www.unicef.org/media/media_48749.html

What is Happening in Sri lankan Genocide & Children - See some reports released within few days:

1.  Malnutrition in mothers triggers Jaundice, Hepatitis in newborns (May 09, 2009)
Lack of basic nutrients in food available to lactating mothers is causing severe cases of jaundice and hepatitis-A in the new borns and months old babies inside the safe-zone where an estimated 120,000-165,000 Tamil civilians are struggling to stay alive, medical sources within the safe zone said Saturday. Mothers have flocked to the temporary hospital relocated to junior school, crying and pleading with the doctors for milk-powder, but hospital stocks are completely depleted, according to Vanni medical sources.

2. Extortion through abduction of children increases in Jaffna (Tamil area) - May 09, 2009
Officers of local UN organizations in Jaffna peninsula have complained to Sri Lanka Army (SLA) high authorities in Jaffna of demands of extortion and intimidation that their school going children will be abducted, sources in Jaffna said. Though the said officers confirmed the demands and intimidation they refused to give additional information. The persons alleged to be the perpetrators are Sri Lanka Army (SLA) backed paramilitary men who move freely during SLA imposed curfew hours and around SLA camps in the peninsula, civil society sources in Jaffna said.

3. SLA steps up carnage on civilians - May 08, 2009
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=29296)
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has continued heavy shelling with cluster-munitions on civilian targets in Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal within the so-called safety zone throughout Thursday and Friday. Several civilians have been killed and many sustained injuries as Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) surveillance aircraft was providing coordinates of densely populated places for the SLA to target civilians. At least 242 civilians were registered as wounded on Friday alone. Medical sources reported that 45 of the wounded, including 15 children, had succumbed to injuries adding that scores were killed and that those killed on the spot were not brought to hospital.

4. Events unfold typical of Nazi concentration camps - April 30, 2009
http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=79&artid=29218
Food parcels were thrown to people after making them run like dogs, and two children were killed in the melee in the barbed-wire camp at Menik Farm, Vavuniyaa. A 12-year-old boy on Monday and a 7-year-old boy on Tuesday were crushed to death in the melee, media sources in Vavuniyaa said. Meanwhile, around 300 Tamil youth from several camps in the area were forcefully taken by the Sri Lanka army, in the name of arrest, amidst protests of family members on Tuesday. Recently, 60 people have died of sickness in the camps, the sources further said. A total of 154,368 Vanni civilians are in captivity by the SLA up to Wednesday and out of them, 90, 181, were captured after 20 April.

5. Starvation: Colombo deploys the worst genocidal weapon April 25, 2009
No food shipment was sent to the safety zone after 02 April. Even the earlier supplies were pathetically inadequate. The World Food Programme (WFP) shipment that already set sailing with 1,500 MT food items and was scheduled to arrive in Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal has been diverted to Jaffna in the last minute by the Colombo government, citing ‘security reasons', civil officials inside the zone told TamilNet Saturday. People starve beyond imagination, subsisting just on fish and prawns caught amidst high risk of SLA attack and eating them semi-raw, roasted in fire, as there is no cooking oil.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=29169)

6. 9,966 children in Jaffna victimized in 2008, Jaffna tops in school drop-outs (http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=29081)
Nearly 5% of the children in Jaffna peninsula have either lost one of their parents or separated from, due to Sri Lanka Army (SLA) harassment, killings, arrests and forced disappearances, according to the 2008 statistics report submitted to Jaffna Government Agent (GA) by Jaffna District Children Welfare Centre (JDCWC) in Jaffna Secretariat. A total of 9,666 children in Jaffna peninsula have been victimized by the above humanitarian violations in 2008, the statistics revealed. Meanwhile, Jaffna district tops the list of school children drop outs compared to other districts in the country, according to Jaffna GA who commented on the statistics report.

Many Many more stories of Genocide.......Please understand and do a research

PLEASE SEE UK'S MOST RESPECTED TV "CHANNEL 4" REPORT ON SRI LANKA - May 5, 2009

Grim scenes at Sri Lankan camps
Updated on 05 May 2009
By Nick Paton Walsh

Channel 4 News reports from a camp in the northern Sri Lankan city of Vavuniya, where Tamil refugees have been taken.

Shocking claims have emerged of shortages of food and water, dead bodies left where they have fallen, women separated from their families, and even sexual abuse.

This programme obtained the first independently filmed pictures from the internment camps set up by the Sri Lankan government to house Tamils who have fled the country's civil war.
There are at least a hundred thousand Tamils from the country's north held in these camps, and while the government insists their stay there is temporary, aid workers say there is not as yet a concrente plan for their resettlement into the country's north. As access to the camps is prohibited to journalists, unless they are under military escort, independent information about conditions inside is hard to come by.

But Channel Four News managed to send a cameraman into the camps who filmed, without army escort, who filmed these scenes. The cameraman also interviewed a number of relatives of people held inside and, importantly, a number of aid workers. They gave the first independent testimony of life inside. Stories of children trampled in the rush to get food; of three women's bodies found in a bathing area in the open.

The information emerges at a time when the camps are the subject of great controversy. The international community, through the UN and aid agencies, are helping to build and organise aid inside the growing camp network which may one day need to hold 230,000 people.

Critics say the UN money is in effect being used to help the Sri Lankan government build a huge internment camp system.

One aid worker we speak to says he has been told by government officials, the camp system may need to last for over 3 years.

Sri Lanka: Repeated Shelling of Hospitals Evidence of War Crimes - Human Rights Watch - May 8, 2009
30 Attacks Reported on Medical Facilities Since December
(http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/05/08/sri-lanka-repeated-shelling-hospitals-evidence-war-crimes_

(New York) - The Sri Lankan armed forces have repeatedly struck hospitals in the northern Vanni region in indiscriminate artillery and aerial attacks, Human Rights Watch said today. Commanders responsible for ordering or conducting such attacks may be prosecuted for war crimes.

Patients, medical staff, aid workers, and other witnesses have provided Human Rights Watch with information about at least 30 attacks on permanent and makeshift hospitals in the combat area since December 2008. One of the deadliest took place on May 2, when artillery shells struck Mullaivaikal hospital in the government-declared "no-fire zone," killing 68 persons and wounding 87.

"Hospitals are supposed to be sanctuaries from shelling, not targets," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "While doctors and nurses struggle to save lives in overcrowded and underequipped facilities, Sri Lankan army attacks have hit one hospital after another."  

If one reads the article and the comments - article does not seem reliable or informative. Author needs some basic knowledge on this area or at least historical perspective of this conflict. Sorry!

While the article might be lacking on the background of the conflict in Sri Lanka, I just want to point out that the basic point remains the same - that trafficking/modern day slavery happens in many different forms - not just for the sex industry.  As Dennis G pointed out, the use of child soldiers is not new.  I appreciate the fact that the post's author labeled the use of child soldiers as trafficking - in my experience those are two terms that are not often linked (and to the extent that they are, it seems to be a fairly recent thing, at least as far as common discussion labels). 

As the posts from Mike indicate, BOTH sides in the conflict are using child soldiers.  This is unacceptable.  It is horrifying.  And I don't care how many promises are made to UNICEF - I don't believe either side when it says it will stop.