CHILD SOLDIERS from Early Warning to Justice and Reconciliation ALLONS-Y

ALLONS-YVOLUME 1, NUMBER 1 | AUGUST 2016 THEORY INTO ACTION CHILD SOLDIERS From Early Warning to Justice and Reconciliation ALLONS-Y Volume 1, Number 1 | August 2016 TABLE OF CONTENTS ISSN 2371-4387 (Print) ISSN 2371-4395 (Online) D I ABOUT THE DALLAIRE INITIATIVE ..................................................... 03 Editor Dustin Johnson A Y ABOUT ALLONS-Y ............................................................................. 05 Contributors Nicholas Coghlan, LGen Roméo Dallaire (Ret’d), Dustin Johnson, D J LETTER FROM THE EDITOR .............................................................. 06 Michelle Legassicke, Jacqueline Salomé, & BGen (Ret’d) Kenneth Watkin, QC R D PREFACE ........................................................................................... 08 Design General Public Creative Direction Josh Boyter CYCLICAL YOUTH-LED CONFLICT Front Cover Photo UN Photo/Helena Mulkerns AS AN EARLY WARNING INDICATOR ................................................ 11 Back Cover Photo UN Photo/Stuart Price Author Sketches Alice MacLean M L Article by Michelle Legassicke ...................................................... 11 N C Expert commentary by Nicholas Coghlan ..................................... 27 Publisher The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative Centre for Foreign Policy Studies CHILDREN, ACCOUNTABILITY, AND JUSTICE: Dalhousie University ADVANCING RESTORATIVE JUSTICE FOR Halifax, Nova Scotia CHILD SOLDIERS AND CHILD PIRATES ............................................ 33 The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative would like to thank Josh Boyter, J S Article by Jacqueline Salomé ........................................................ 33 Sam Holland, Dr. Shelly Whitman, Tanya Zayed, and the peer reviewers for K W Expert commentary by BGen (Ret’d) Kenneth Watkin, QC ........... 53 their critical contributions to this first edition of Allons-y. C P CALL FOR PAPERS FOR THE NEXT EDITION .................................... 58 The views, opinions, and analyses expressed in this volume are those of C A CALL FOR ARTWORK FOR THE NEXT EDITION ................................ 61 the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative. This publication is available for free download at: childsoldiers.org/allonsy For more information, please contact [email protected] ©2016 The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative. All rights reserved. Allons-y, volume 1, number 1 | August 2016 1 D I ABOUT THE DALLAIRE INITIATIVE The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative was established in 2007 by retired lieutenant- general the honourable Roméo Dallaire, former force commander of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR). Our mission is to progressively eradicate the use of child soldiers through a preventative security sector approach. To achieve this important objective, the Dallaire Initiative conducts activities on three fronts: • It conducts world-class interdisciplinary research to build—and share—knowledge, which in turn leads to new solutions; • It engages in high-level advocacy activities to create and promote the political will to end the use of children as soldiers; • It delivers tactical, prevention-oriented training to security sector actors, so as to promote broader security sector reform. In every aspect of its work, the Dallaire Initiative seeks to collaborate with concerned governments, security sector actors, academics, humanitarians and civilian communities. In particular, its unique approach working with soldiers, police, prison personnel and private security operators – many of whom are the first point of contact for child soldiers outside of their armed force or armed group – is both groundbreaking and critical to the interruption of children’s recruitment. 2 Article Name, Author Allons-y, volume 1, number 1 | August 2016 3 A Y ABOUT ALLONS-Y In January 1994, General Dallaire, then the Force Commander of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR), sent a fax to UN headquarters in New York warning of the impending genocide. He signed the fax with the line “peux ce que veux. Allons-y” – “Where there’s a will, there’s a way. Let’s go.” At the time, there was not a will among the international community, with lethal results for nearly a million Rwandans. Since then, General Dallaire has worked tirelessly to ensure that there is both a will and a way to prevent mass atrocities in the future. However, action must be informed by understanding for it to be effective. Each of us has the ability to stand up and contribute to prevention of these crimes and the involvement of children in committing them. Allons-y serves as a call to action for young people today to add their talent, perspectives, and experiences to this mission. Allons-y is a series of peer-reviewed papers written by young academics and practitioners, complemented by expert commentary, designed to foster discussion and innovative thinking on issues relating to children in war, terrorism, and violence. This format seeks to leverage the unique viewpoints and contributions of young people working and studying in this field, and magnifies their impact by pairing each piece with the voice of leading experts. This combination firmly situates each piece in praxis, bridging the all-too-frequent gaps between academics and practitioners. 4 LGenArticle Roméo Name, Dallaire Author , Rwanda 1994. Used under permission from the National Speakers Bureau. Allons-y, volume 1, number 1 | August 2016 5 Each of these pieces is accompanied by an expert commentary, situating it in the broader context and commenting on its importance for practitioners. Nicholas Coghlan, Canada’s ambassador to South Sudan from 2014 to 2016, comments on Michelle’s piece, and Kenneth D Watkin, comments on Jaqueline’s piece. All too often in our work there is a gap in interaction, discussion, and learning between academics and practitioners; and a gap in time between when data is collected and when academic research on that data gets published. Allons-y attempts to address these gaps, and the expert commentaries are a key part of this. They both increase interaction between practitioners and academics, and situate the academic pieces in the present J moment in our rapidly changing world. As editor of Allons-y, I hope that these insightful pieces will stimulate further thought and debate among academics and practitioners and help to advance the importance of children to the peace and security agenda. Dustin Johnson LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Editor of Allons-y and Program Officer at the Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative Within this issue of Allons-y, two talented graduate students provide fascinating examinations of the present-day use of child soldiers. In the 21st Century, children are the primary victims of war, A UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) peacekeeper from Mongolia in Bentiu, South Sudan searches for early warning indicators, August 2014 (UN Photo/JC McIlwaine) but their use as soldiers is also a primary driver of conflict, one which requires a comprehensive and holistic approach. This publication aims to promote interdisciplinary praxis to contribute to ending this scourge of modern warfare. Michelle Legassicke, a PhD candidate in political science at Dalhousie University and a Research Fellow here at the Dallaire Initiative, examines the prevalence of children in cattle raiding in South Sudan prior to the outbreak of the civil war there in 2013, and how this correlates to the levels of violence experienced during the war, showing its utility as an early warning indicator. This war is one of the gravest on the planet, with actions amounting to genocide, which the international community has abjectly failed to prevent. Jacqueline Salomé, a research assistant at Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, examines the use of restorative justice for former child soldiers, and the failure to apply it to child pirates, arguing that it is important to apply this form of justice to all militarized children and not selectively to only those who do not directly threaten Western interests, and that it can serve as a powerful preventative mechanism. Despite the commonalities among children used in war, criminal enterprise, and terrorism, the opposite responses applied to children depending on how we label them undermine the commitments that almost all nations have made to upholding the rights of children. 6 Allons-y, volume 1, number 1 | August 2016 7 R D PREFACE War has changed – children around the world are now being pulled into war at alarming rates, creating the ever-growing threat of child soldiers on the battlefield. Using the combined perspectives of humanitarians, militaries, police, and academics, we are aiming to make a long- term impact in the fight against the recruitment and use of child soldiers. The past few years have seen new crises erupt into large scale violence and sometimes mass atrocities in many countries, from Nigeria to the Central African Republic to Yemen, and beyond. In each of these situations, the international community was unable to muster a fully To confront these challenges, we need new tactics. One of these is seeing child soldiers as the preventative response as signs of impending crisis emerged. Despite the focus on early warning early warning indicator that they are. We must also recognize the breadth of this issue. Children mechanisms over the past decade, we still lack the ability to properly intervene to prevent these are not

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