Activists launch campaign against recruitment of child soldiers in north Syria

An activist group in northern Syria is opposing the mass recruitment of children into the ranks of the al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra Front that has seen up to 500 minors drafted into fighter training camps since April. 

The activists, mainly centred around Idlib, have launched an initiative called “Children, Not Soldiers” with the intention of pushing back against the recruitment of minors by militants of the al-Qaeda affiliate, which dominates large parts of Idlib province.

Assam Zaydan, a former civil engineering student from the Idlib countryside, helped the launch the campaign with colleagues from another civil activist organisation called Jabhat al-Nusra Violations, which documents abuses in northern Syria by the Al-Qaeda-affiliated group.

According to Zaydan, Nusra launched a child recruitment drive entitled "Join Up” on 21 April 2016 in Idlib and Aleppo as well as the countryside surrounding those two cities.

He said Nusra managed to conscript about 500 children to join the militants, the largest number from IDP camps in the border area.

Children who signed up were offered between $100 to $150 and weapons.

It was this discovery that led Zaydan and his colleagues to launch the Children, Not Soldiers campaign, despite financial and social difficulties in starting the group.

Translation: Live your childhood free of weapons

“Our campaign has no administrative or financial funding,” he said. “In terms of promotion, most of it is done through social media and some newspapers that deal with this topic.”

Now based in Turkey after being threatened by Nusra, Zaydan said his group has spoken to many children who have been drafted into Nusra’s training camps, trying to persuade them to desert the group.

“We told them that they should sign up at schools instead,” he told MEE.

“We were able to offer some of them work opportunities, because what they really need is money to help their families. The posters that we have distributed in schools and near al-Qaeda's training camps have also helped to raise the children's awareness.”

Translate: Save your children from the camps of Jabhat al-Nusra

Unsurprisingly, Nusra reacted harshly to the new campaign - Zaydan said that the militant group was now “searching” for the Children, Not Soldiers activists.

A documentary released by Vice News gave an insight into Nusra’s youth training camps, following a group of children and their adult trainers as they were shaped into fighters for “jihad”.

“We call this generation, ‘the cubs of a lion’, and as you know a lion represents power,” says one of the adult Nusra fighters.

Nusra is seen indoctrinating the youths into their strict brand of Salafist Islam, praising Osama Bin Laden, with one child expressing his desire to become a suicide bomber.

Another video, released last week, also appears to show Nusra adolescents training in the town of Bidama in Idlib province:

A group allied to Nusra in the Jaish al-Fatah coalition that controls Idlib province, the Uighur-led Turkistan Islamic Party, also released a video and photos of child recruits being trained in Syria:

Children have been one of the main victims of Syria’s brutal conflict. With hundreds of thousands out of school, starving, killed and besieged, a whole generation has faced becoming “lost” as a result of a seemingly endless war.

One of the unpleasant fates facing many children in Syria is to be recruited by one of the many armed groups to become fighters, picking up guns, firing mortars or even serving as suicide bombers.

A June 2015 report of the United Nations secretary-general to the Security Council confirmed cases of 271 boys and seven girls being recruited into armed groups - though the official figure is likely much higher.

They documented 142 with the Free Syrian Army, 24 with the pro-Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), 69 with the Islamic State (IS) group and 25 with Nusra.

In March, UNICEF warned that children as young as seven were being recruited to fight and said the trend was increasing.

"Children report being actively encouraged to join the war by parties to the conflict offering gifts and 'salaries' of up to $400 a month,” the organisation said in a statement.

UNICEF said that more than half of the children that it verified as having been recruited in 2015 were under the age of 15.

According to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the conscription or enlistment of children under 15 by members of armed forces or non-state armed groups or to use them to participate actively in hostilities, is a war crime.

Backlash against al-Qaeda

The campaign against the Nusra recruitment drive is just the latest in a backlash against Al-Qaeda and its allies in Syria, who many activists claim have "hijacked" their revolution.

One of the focal points for the anti-recruitment campaign has been the town of Maarat al-Numan, which has in recent months been a hub for anti-Nusra protests, which sparked off after Nusra arrested the Free Syrian Army-affiliated Division 13.

Following huge protests - including the burning down of one of their headquarters - Nusra eventually relented and released the Division 13 fighters.

Although the use of child soldiers in Syria appears widespread, Zaydan said that Children, Not Soldiers was gaining support and that groups like theirs and Jabhat al-Nusra Violations would continue, despite the risk from Al-Qaeda-affiliated groups.

"It is only the extremist and radical factions that are angry about our campaign and that have taken a stance against it," he said.

"As for the other revolutionary organisations, such as media and humanitarian bodies, they have publicly supported our campaign and encouraged us to continue."