American's taxpayer money is being given as foreign aid to countries that use child soldiers in their militaries. It is unacceptable that the U.S. is putting guns into the hands of children!

No child should have to experience the violence of a war zone, much less be actively recruited or abducted and forced to participate in the horrors of battle. Both girls and boys, some as young as four years old, are given guns and ordered to kill. Evelyn, from Uganda, was only 10 years old when a militia group pillaged her village, killed her family and took the little girl to be part of their army. Forced to kill or be killed, Evelyn suffered from physical, mental and emotional abuse until she escaped. 

Her story is the story of 300,000 other child soldiers around the world. While there are international rules about the recruitment of minors, those laws are woefully unmonitored or enforced. The US government has a policy against giving aid, specifically military aid, to governments who use child soldiers but for years, some of the worst offenders have been ignored or granted exemptions. Your tax dollars are funding guns and military training for children! 

While the specific number of children being used in U.S. supported armies is difficult to estimate, the following countries have well-documented violations but continue to receive aid. 

• Burma 
• Democratic Republic of the Congo
• Iran
• Iraq
• Mali
• Niger
• Nigeria
• Somalia
• South Sudan
• Syria
• Yemen
• Afghanistan

Without the threat of strict enforcement, these countries have no incentive to stop exploiting innocent children but there are documented examples where being on the list, and facing the repercussions, does cause positive change. 

Foreignpolicy.com reports, "Experts say that putting countries on the child soldiers list sometimes has useful consequences. After the United States put Chad on the list in 2010, 2011, and 2013, the government signed an action plan with the United Nations in 2011 to address the issue; by 2014, the U.N.’s own list of countries that use and recruit child soldiers no longer included Chad."

IT IS TIME TO TAKE A FIRM STANCE!  Voice your opinion to Secretary of State Michael Pompeo to hold the government accountable to firmly enforce The Child Soldiers Prevention Act and add persistent perpetrators like Afghanistan to the CSPA List.

We can't go back in time but we can make a change for the future. We can hold the government accountable to enforce policies that will protect innocent children from becoming bloodstained soldiers.