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| Title: | 'Why We Fight': Voices of Youth Combatants in Sierra Leone |
| Authors: | Peters, Krijn Richards, Paul |
| Year: | 1998 |
| Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
| Volume: | 68 |
| Issue: | 2 |
| Pages: | 183-210 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Sierra Leone |
| Subjects: | civil wars child soldiers Politics and Government nationalism |
| External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/1161278 |
| Abstract: | In the African civil wars of the last twenty years combatants have become increasingly youthful. Combatants may sometimes be as young as 8 or 10, and girl fighters are increasingly common. This article deals with under-age combatants in the civil war in Sierra Leone, which started in 1991. Its purpose is to let young combatants explain themselves direct. The material derives from interviewing under-age ex-combatants undergoing rehabilitation in two programmes in Freetown in 1996. Additional interviews were obtained 'up country' with recently self-demobilized RUF/SL (Revolutionary United Front of Sierra Leone) conscripts. The authors' aim is to build up a 'bank' of interview material as an input to community and agency discussions about options for the demobilization and rehabilitation of children affected by war. A sample of nine interviews is presented here, representating all the major groups of under-age combatants in the war: RSLMF-linked (Republic of Sierra Leone Military Force, the government army) irregular units, the RUF/SL and the Kamajo militia (civil defence groups). Two of the interviews are with abductees who escaped from the RUF/SL. Bibliogr., notes, sum. in English and French. |
