After capturing a LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) security post, Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Defence found some obituary posters. Included on the posters appear to be child soldiers that were killed in action from 17th February to 10th March of this year. From this article:
Referring to recently captured obituary posters from a LTTE office occupied by the security forces the Ministry of defence said, “ no ranks were mentioned against 30 cadres who appear very young in their early or mid-teens.
Human rights organizations have discovered earlier, that tomb stones at LTTE martyr grave yards of dead child soldiers do not indicate their birth dates and only the dates they died obviously to conceal the fact that they were child soldiers.
For more information on the Tamil Tigers and their use of child soldiers, see this earlier post.
For general background on the use of child soldiers in Sri Lanka - from page 310 of the 2008 Report by the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers:
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) continued to recruit and use children, despite repeated commitments not to do so. Children in the east of the country were forcibly recruited and used by the Karuna group, a breakaway group of the LTTE, with the complicity of, and in some instances actively working with, the security forces.
Filed under: Human Rights, Sri Lanka, child soldier , child soldiers, children, current affairs, death, Human Rights, Sri Lanka, War, world
