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Child Soldiers
Edited by: Leora Kahn
Introduction by: Luis Moreno-Ocampo
Photographs by: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, Lynsey Addario, Martin Adler, Richard Butler, Francesco Cito, Gary Calton, Chris de Bode, Donna De Cesare, Miquel Dewever Plana, Tiane Doan na Champassak, Colin Finlay, Riccardo Gangale, Cedric Gerbehaye, Jan Grarup, Tim A. Hetherington, Rhodri Jones, Bob Koenig, Roger Lemoyne, Zed Nelson, Peter Mantello, Heather McClintock, Olivier Pin Fat, Giacomo Pirozzi, Q. Sakamaki, Marcelo Salinas, Dominic Sansoni, Guy Tillim, Sven Torfinn, Ami Vitale, Vincent van de Wijngaard, Tomas van Houtryve, Kadir van Lohuizen, Alvaro Ybarra-Zavala, Francesco Zizola
Essay by: Jo Becker, Jimmi Briggs, Dick Durbin, Emmanuel Jal, Michael Wessells
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“I would like to give you a message. Please do your best to
tell the world what is happening to us, the children, so that
other children don’t have to pass through this violence.”
—A 15-year-old girl who escaped from
the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda
Up to half a million children have been engaged in more
than 85 conflicts worldwide. As armed conflict proliferates,
increasing numbers of children are exposed to the brutalities
of war. Boys and girls around the world are recruited to
be child soldiers by armed forces and militant groups,
either forcibly or voluntarily. Some are tricked into service
by manipulative recruiters, others join in order to escape
poverty or discrimination, while still others are outright
abducted at school, on the streets, and at home. Aside from
participating in combat, many are used for sexual purposes,
made to lay and clear land mines, or employed as spies,
messengers, porters, or servants. Kids have become the
ultimate weapons of twenty-first-century war.
Child Soldiers focuses on countries with a history of
child warfare, as captured by photographers and writers
from across the globe. The book explores the children’s
time as combatants, as well as their demobilization and
rehabilitation. Included are Tim Hetherington’s photographs
from Liberia; Roger Lemoyne and Cedric Gerbehaye’s work
from the Congo; Ami Vitale’s series on child Maoist recruits
in Nepal; and other work from Burma, Columbia, the Central
African Republic, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, and Palestine.
Leora Kahn is the founder of Proof: Media for Social Justice,
a nonprofit organization whose mission is to create awareness
of the issues faced by populations in post-conflict societies
and to encourage social change through the use of photography
and education. Kahn has served as the director of photography
at Workman Publishing and Corbis, and is currently at work on
global projects with Amnesty International, Participant Films,
and the United Nations. She recently edited the Lucie Award winning
Darfur: Twenty Years of War and Genocide in Sudan
(powerHouse Books, 2007) in collaboration with Amnesty, and
curated an accompanying exhibit that will tour the U.S. this
year with the Holocaust Museum Houston. Kahn is currently
working on an exhibition in Rwanda with Aegis Trust about
Hutu rescuers during the genocide.
Child Soldiers features the work of nine prominent photographers,
who have covered the use of children in combat
around the world. Contributing writers include Jo Becker,
Children’s Rights Advocacy Director for Human Rights Watch,
Jimmie Briggs, journalist and author of Innocents Lost: When
Child Soldiers Go to War (Basic Books, 2005), Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, Luis Moreno-
Ocampo, International Criminal Court Prosecutor, Emmanuel
Jal, a Sudanese musician and former child soldier, and Michael
Wessels, a professor of psychology at Columbia University.
powerHouse Books shares the story of a former child soldier
CHILD SOLDIERS
Grace Akallo is a former child soldier. She was abducted and recruited into one of the most brutal rebel militia groups in Uganda, the Lord’s Resistance Army. Lead by the infamous Joseph Kony she was trained to kill for a battle that has endured over twenty years in Uganda, Africa’s longest armed conflict. At 28 years old, she is a spokesperson for human rights and Amnesty International, a co-author of the book Girl Soldier, she has appeared on Oprah, and created her own scholarship program for Ugandan girls rehabilitating from the trauma of child warfare. In this interview she offers heartbreaking insight into the realities of armed conflict as an adolescent.
powerhouse Books: Describe your hometown. What can you remember about your childhood there?
Grace Akallo: I come from Lira, Uganda. I grew up in a small village, Kaberikale. It was nice as a child, peaceful. There was no fear of someone killing you. We used to go to other places to go to school, about 10 to 15 miles away, we used to go with our parents. It was a really good time growing up there. At that time there were small militia groups who were protecting and fighting for the people, they were not harming people, but there was nothing as powerful as LRA.
pHB: How were you captured by the Lord’s Resistance Army?
GA: I was captured in October 9, 1996 by the LRA. I was 15 years old. I remember I was at my high school, St Mary's College. It was only my first year there. They abducted 139 girls. I remember them marching us into the bush. It was a Catholic school and one teacher Sister Rachele, who looked after us, she hid from the rebels and then followed them. She pleaded with them to release the girls. The rebels forced her to remove her veil. She did what they said and they returned 109 girls. Thirty girls remained with the rebels and I was one of them.
pHB: What were you thinking and feeling during the abduction?
GA: All I was feeling was fear. I didn't know what was going to happen. You're scared and your spirit is leaving your body, you don't know what to do. A machete is on your head, you think you are going to die. We were beaten, I didn't get any bullet wounds, but I was abused.
pHB: Can you describe your experience as a child soldier?
GA: They took us deep into the bush in northern Uganda, and we lived there for one month. Later we were divided into two groups of 15. The first group, my group, was taken to Sudan. We trained to build and dismantle a gun and then trained to fight. I was with the LRA for seven months. Every memory is bad. The killing was so bad. We were forced to beat people. We were forced to become wives of the rebel men. I was given to a man older then my father.
pHB: How did you escape from the LRA?
GA: After seven months, the Sudan Liberation Army who were fighting against their government for the people, joined forces with the Ugandan government. They knew where the LRA was. They attacked the camp we were in. At once people started running. I ran away and spent three days in the bush by myself, people from southern Sudan found me and I made way back to Uganda.
pHB: How did you recover from the trauma of this experience?
GA: I was determined to do something for myself. I went back to school and I finished high school. I joined Uganda Christian University to study communications and then transferred to Gordon University in Massachusetts. I did want be a journalist, but now I love my new International Development program, at Clark University. It integrates peace building, education, which I'm interested in, because most people coming back from the bush need education to rebuild their lives. It won't stop people going to the army to fight. At first I wanted to do conflict resolution, but I really love this program. I would like to return one day to Uganda and create schools and education program to promote progress in the region.
pHB: Do you follow the political situation back in Uganda?
GA: Following politics sometimes makes me so angry. I heard recently that a young child soldier who was recruited by the rebels tried to return to Africa, but they wouldn't give him a visa because he was considered a rebel. Even though he was kidnapped and forced into war, they rejected him. Government is promoting pure hatred through this. What do they expect the children to do? To stay in the country just like that as criminals or never return to their country?
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