More than 650 children have been recruited into armed groups in South Sudan since the beginning of the year taking to an estimated 16,000 the numebr of children who have joined armed groups since December, 2013, according to UNICEF.
The UN child focused agency last week called for an immediate end to the recruitment of children and the unconditional release of those who have already joined with various armed groups.
Justin Forsyth, UNICEF’s deputy executive director, said in a statement that, given the “precarious stage” in the country’s short history, UNICEF “fears that a further spike in child recruitment could be imminent”.
UNICEF last year oversaw the release of 1,775 child soldiers in South Sudan but now fear that the renewed fighting and recruitment of children taking place in the country will undermine this progress.
Mr Forsyth said children also continued to “ensure horrific ordeals” in the country. “Recent reports point to widespread sexual violence against girls and women,” he said. “The systematic use of rape, sexual exploitation and abduction as a weapon of war in South Sudan must cease, together with the impunity for all perpetrators.”
Some 900,000 children have been displaced from their homes but remained in South Sudan since fighting broke out in December, 2013, while more than 13,000 children are missing, have been separated from their families or an unaccompanied.
More than half of all South Sudanese children are out of school, the highest proportion of any nation in the world, while 250,000 face severe acute malnutrition.
