CHILDREN APPEAL FOR END TO CHILD SOLDIER USE -- Children from more than 100 countries recently appealed to world leaders to do more to end to the use of children as combatants in armed conflicts. Despite international protocols preventing the practice, an estimated 250,000 children around the globe are fighting as soldiers. Former child soldiers and young activists personally delivered their plea in the form of a petition featuring 250,000 red handprints to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Feb. 12, the fifth anniversary of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Child soldiers are still being used in 17 countries, including some of the 126 countries that have ratified the protocol.
Rights & Wrongs: Child Soldiers, Human Trafficking and More
