The International Day against the Use of Child Soldiers, also known as Red Hand Day, is observed every year on January 12 to denounce the involvement of children under the age of 18 in armed conflicts.
Child Soldiers International (CSI), an international advocacy group against child soldiers, published a United Nations report on Monday.
The report said that in 2012, there were 3,159 cases of children involved in military conflicts in 12 countries, while in 2017 that figure reached 8,185 children in 15 countries, an increase of 159 per cent.
'These statistics alone are shocking and probably only scratch the surface on the true scale of child exploitation by armed actors around the world,' said CSI Director Isabelle Guitard.
(Photograph:AFP)
The UN's cultural agency UNICEF, furthermore, said that it has verified the recruitment of another 3,000 children in the DRC in 2017, by the numerous active militias in the northeast of the country, such as the Bana Mura and Kamwina Nsapu militant groups.
(Photograph:Reuters)