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The Effects Of Underage Soldiers On Children

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Children all across world are being exploited as child soldiers. Everyday kids younger the age of 10 are putting their lives on the line mostly by force. ¨Over the last ten years, two million children have been killed in conflict. Over one million have been orphaned, over six million have been seriously injured or permanently disabled and over ten million have been left with serious psychological trauma.¨(Children In Conflict). A child soldier is a child with armed forces; they’re trained to fight, cook, be porters, messengers, informant spies, etc. Countries all across the world have been using children to fight, places like the United Kingdom, Africa, and Asia lean on children to do their dirty work regardless of what laws are put …show more content…

During his counseling sessions he was often told to relive his experiences while being a soldier and he’d be lost in a trance. His body would begin to tremble in response to the memories. To get him to snap out of it doctors had to shake him and call his name until he woke up. Eventually he began to make major improvements but the process was most painful and seemed impossible at times(Singh) but a lot of children are not so lucky to be able to get counselling. Children go into armed forces at such a young age, with an immature mind and see awful things that not even adults are ready to see and are forced to be okay with it. No amount of professional help can make a person go completely back to normal after experiences of such a high magnitude. In the United Kingdom, enlistment age starts as young as 16. ¨In 2015, 1 in 4 new recruits to the British army were children under the age of 18 targeted for the front line combat roles such as infantry which suffers more fatalities than any other part of armed forces.¨(Child-soldiers UK). Children in the UK army that started at age 16 are often times forced to stay within the army for much longer than one that joined at age 18, which can lead to many emotional and mental health issues. The UK is the only European country to send minors routinely into battle even after signing OPAC, they are one of the 14 that have yet to ratify the protocol. Many countries within Africa recruit

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