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Where do the LTTE's 'Tiger' children figure

Appeal to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe

When a child jockey returns home

Celebrating children's day

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[LTTE Child Soldiers; Source: Dominic Sansoni]

A group of LTTE child soldiers who surrendered in October 1998 claimed that 75% of LTTE fighters are children. During the same period the LTTE stepped  up it's recruitment drive of children and at least 150-200 children were added to the ranks.

In october 1999, Mr. Ottunu reminded the LTTE of it's commitment to end the use of child combatants. In early 2000, the UTHR-J (University Teachers' Human Rights- Jaffna) claimed that the LTTE was increasingly turning to school children to replenish its strength.

In a press release on October 11th 2001, Amnesty International reported that in spite of assurances given by the LTTE to end the use of child combatants, it had received complaints of recruitment of children. It said that though the total number of children recruited was  difficult to establish, it is estimated to be several hundred. It also mentioned that the LTTE's recruitment policy was that one person from each family has to do "military service"'.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) have been fighting an insurgency war in Sri Lanka for the past 20 years. Their demand, 'a separate state for the Hindu Tamil minority' in the Buddhist Sinhalese majority country.

In September 2002, the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE entered into peace talks to end the 20 year insurgency war waged by the rebel group.

The LTTE once again promised the human rights groups and the international community that it would not use or recruit children as combatants. Along the same lines, the rebel group highly publicized the release of 165 child soldiers in December last year.

On December 19th 2002, human rights monitors reported that between 18 to 60 children, some as young as 12 were forcibly recruited from various villages by the LTTE. Reports mentioned that most were taken forcibly from their homes while others went "voluntarily" to spare their parents after the LTTE repeatedly threatened them if they did not supply the movement with a child. All the children were loaded into tractor-trailers and taken away.

Between March 2002 to December 2002, the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission received 600 complaints from parents about child abductions by the LTTE. The group has confirmed the recruitment of 281 children by the LTTE and is investigating another 400 cases. "These numbers are only the tip of the iceberg" said the group's spokesman, Teitur Torkelsson.

The government's chief negotiator G.L. Peiris when questioned about the government's stance on the use of child combatants by the LTTE said, that it was being referred to "among other matters". 

As the Sri Lankan government negotiates a deal with the LTTE in far-away lands, the reality of the LTTE breaking its promises time and again and the government's low priority on discussing the use of child combatants by the LTTE hits hard.

Though the efforts by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe are especially significant to end the 20 year insurgency war, the government's retribution to nearly 4,000 children who are have died or are still with the LTTE is not satisfying. This is a violation of children's rights that certainly deserves more attention than being discussed "among other matters". We appeal to you to urge Sri Lanka's Prime Minister to do justice to all those families who have lost their children and are even now losing their children to the LTTE.

[Sri Lankan Children, Source: BBC]

Efforts to Rehabilitate Child Soldiers in Sri Lanka

With peace bids currently ongoing between the government and the LTTE, the enrollment of children has increased from 50,000 to more than 75,000 in the main conflict affected regions in Sri Lanka. "Most of the children were enrolled in grade one, many school buildings torn down by the war have been repaired and tents are being used as classrooms in other regions", the education minister said while speaking of the encouraging number of children admitted to schools.

During the war, the northeast pasrt of the island were adversely affected with nearly 65,000 children unable to attend school and the drop-out rate was as high as 16 percent compared to the national 4 percent. The 20 year insurgency war has resulted in about 65,000 deaths and the displacement of nearly 1.6 million people. 

When a child jockey return home

[Child camel jockey from Bangladesh shows scars on his hands; Source: AP]

[child camel jockey from Bangladesh shows scars on his legs; Source: AP]

Masud was trafficked from Bangladesh to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at the age of 5 to be used as a child jockey, a popular sport in the Arab nation. He was stolen by one Syed Mia from a relatives house and had been sold to a company owning camels for races in the UAE.

Masud was recued by the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers Association (BNWLA) who were contacted by the boy's family when they saw him on Television. After verifying the claim, BNWLA found Masud abandoned by his trafficker and brought him back to Bangladesh.

In his village, Maud's mother, his four sisters, two brothers and family members waited along with 500 other village members to welcome Masud back home with flowers and sweets.

The focus of the conference was the trafficking of children to be used as camel jockeys. It is estimated that anywhere between 100 to 1,000 children are working as camel jockeys in the UAE alone, the majority of them trafficked from Bangladesh.

While talking about his life in the UAE, Masud mentioned that he was given 'hormone injection' to retard his growth and keep his weight within limit so that he could continue to be a camel jockey.

"I won many races as a jockey and my employer, an Arab, paid me 350 riyals per month", said Masud. The hormone injections did their job.

The trafficking of child camel jockeys from Bangladesh to the UAE is a reality. In spite of being signatories of the ILO Convention 182 and the UN Convention on Rights of the Child, both these nations have failed in protecting their children from being exploited in inhuman ways.

Celebrating Children's Day

Thailand celebrated it's National Children's Day on January 11, 2003 [More]

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