{"id":38096,"date":"2020-08-28T21:42:26","date_gmt":"2020-08-28T21:42:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jww.org\/?p=38096"},"modified":"2020-08-28T21:42:26","modified_gmt":"2020-08-28T21:42:26","slug":"boko-haram-cameroon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/boko-haram-cameroon\/","title":{"rendered":"Evidence shows that Boko Haram used children as suicide bombers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shocking evidence has emerged that Boko Haram, an Islamist armed extremist group operating in the Lake Chad Basin, uses children as suicide bombers.\u00a0 This is both a war crime and a crime against humanity. On August 1, 2020, Boko Haram used <\/span>child suicide bombers<\/span><\/a> in an unlawful attack on a site for displaced persons in the Far North region of Cameroon. The attack killed at least 17 civilians, including five children and six women and wounded at least 16.\u00a0 The attack\u2019s nature demonstrates a callousness and utter disregard for human life that is in line with history\u2019s most brutal atrocity crimes.<\/span><\/p>\n

A few weeks later, on August 18, 2020, the Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA), a splinter cell of Boko Haram, took hundreds of Kukawa townspeople in Borno state <\/span>hostage<\/span><\/a>, following a shootout with the Nigerian military.\u00a0 Many Kukawa residents had only just returned to their homes under military escort on August 2, having lived in displacement camps since a bloody attack on their town caused them to flee in November 2018.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Boko Haram and ISWA have steadily intensified their attacks in northeastern Nigeria and other parts of the Lake Chad region over the past year, murdering hundreds of people and ramping up their recruitment of child soldiers from displaced people\u2019s camps.\u00a0 Millions of civilians have had no choice but to move into squalid camps throughout the region, but they are not safe even there.\u00a0 Despite local authorities\u2019 efforts over the past two years to encourage the displaced to return home, Boko Haram has found new ways of preying upon them, including by attacking villages after fresh returns and using the IDP camps as a <\/span>seedbed for recruits<\/span><\/a>, including, most disturbingly, children.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is Boko Haram?<\/b><\/h2>\n

Boko Haram loosely translates to \u201cWestern education is forbidden.\u201d\u00a0 It was formed in northeastern Nigeria in 2009 to overthrow Nigeria\u2019s secular government.\u00a0 The group made headlines in August of 2014, when it kidnapped 276 <\/span>schoolgirls<\/span><\/a> from the town of Chibok in Borno State, Nigeria.\u00a0 Its operations have since spread to neighboring countries in the Lake Chad Basin, including <\/span>Chad<\/span><\/a>, Niger, and northern Cameroon.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2015, Boko Haram split, giving way to the formation of its offshoot ISWA, which pledged allegiance to the Islamic State.\u00a0 Both groups have wreaked havoc across the Lake Chad region, carrying out abhorrent, indiscriminate attacks on civilian populations.\u00a0 These attacks have included killings, abductions, widespread pillaging and looting of civilian property, and suicide bombings of civilian infrastructure like marketplaces, schools, churches, displacement camps, bus stations, and mosques.\u00a0 The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that Boko Haram has killed 35,000 civilians since 2009, and <\/span>2.7 million <\/span><\/a>remain displaced in northeastern Nigeria due to the constant state of insecurity.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Atrocity Crimes Underway<\/b><\/h2>\n

Boko Haram and ISWA are guilty of many crimes, but perhaps none as vile as the recruitment and use of children as fighters and suicide bombers.\u00a0 The recruitment of children under 15 into fighting forces–made even more heinous when they are weaponized as human bombs–is a war crime under international humanitarian law.\u00a0 Non-state actors may perpetrate war crimes, so even armed extremist groups like Boko Haram and ISWA can be charged with these crimes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Many agree the ongoing clashes between these Islamist groups and the governments of Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger constitute an armed conflict under international humanitarian law.\u00a0 However, even if Boko Haram\u2019s actions are perceived as occurring outside a conflict setting, they still constitute crimes against humanity.\u00a0 These are widespread or systematic violations targeting civilian populations, perpetrated by either state or non-state actors, in times of war or peace.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The conscription of children by armed forces is one of the driving forces of atrocity situations worldwide.\u00a0 Child soldiering violates international law, whether the children are abducted against their will or join voluntarily.\u00a0 Children in crisis settings serve as a replenishable resource to fuel endless cycles of violence for those who wish to create chaos to gain power and wealth in fragile states.\u00a0 The recruitment of children also destroys society\u2019s social fabric, robbing already traumatized communities of their future and ability to rebuild.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What Can You Do<\/b><\/h2>\n

Congress is attempting to combat the scourge of child soldiering, among other child rights violations, through the Congressional Resolution to End Violence Against Children Globally (H.Res. 230\/S. Res. 112).\u00a0 The resolution calls upon Congress to develop and implement a coordinated strategy to combat violence against children worldwide.\u00a0 It recognizes child soldiering as a key manifestation of this violence, impacting children in places like South Sudan, Syria, Somalia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.\u00a0 The resolution recommends the implementation of the INSPIRE package of interventions \u2013 a set of seven evidence-based strategies developed by UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO), in coordination with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The House of Representatives passed H. Res. 230 in March 2020. Now we need your help to ensure the Senate passes the resolution, too, to create a comprehensive strategy to help children caught in crisis.\u00a0 This is a critical first step to strategically prioritizing child protection in the U.S.\u2019s development work abroad.\u00a0 So that, one day, we never have to hear the words \u201cchild suicide bomber\u201d again.<\/span><\/p>\n

JWW\u2019s work on Child Soldiering<\/b><\/h2>\n

While JWW does not currently have projects on the ground in the Lake Chad Basin, we work extensively with local organizations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Child soldiering continues to be a formidable problem and a major driver of the ongoing atrocities in the country.\u00a0 Recently, we have been working with a <\/span>remarkable organization<\/span><\/a> whose staff risk their lives every day to negotiate directly with armed group leaders to release child soldiers, child sex slaves, and child servants in their ranks.\u00a0 This past year alone, our collaboration resulted in the extraction of over <\/span>1,400 children<\/b>!\u00a0 That\u2019s 1,400 kids who will have a new lease on life thanks to your support.<\/span><\/p>\n

While most of these children were reunified with their families and reintegrated into their communities before COVID-19 struck the Congo, around 500 children must stay in our partner\u2019s transit centers while much of the country remains in lockdown in response to COVID-19.\u00a0 JWW mobilized quickly to issue an emergency COVID-19 grant to supply these children and the staff taking care of them with <\/span>food<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>personal protective equipment <\/span><\/a>(PPE) until they can be reunited with their families once COVID-related restrictions are lifted.\u00a0 Please go to JWW\u2019s brand new <\/span>MARKETPLACE FOR GOOD<\/span><\/a>, where you can purchase food and masks that will sustain and protect these children during this critical transitional period.\u00a0 Join us in giving them back their childhood and standing for the protection of war-affected children everywhere.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shocking evidence has emerged that Boko Haram, an Islamist armed extremist group operating in the Lake Chad Basin, uses children as suicide bombers.\u00a0 This is both a war crime and a crime against humanity. On August 1, 2020, Boko Haram used child suicide bombers in an unlawful attack on a site for displaced persons in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":38097,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[190],"tags":[241,242,243],"class_list":["post-38096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","tag-attack","tag-boko-haram","tag-child-soldiers","category-190","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38096\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}