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Secretary of State Rex Tillerson Accused of Violating Law to Prevent Child Soldiers
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has been accused by State Department diplomats of violating the Child Soldier Prevention Act (CSPA), a United States federal statute signed into law by President George W. Bush in October 2008.
CSPA states that the U.S. government must be satisfied that no children under the age of 18 “are recruited, conscripted or otherwise compelled to serve as child soldiers” for a country to be removed from the list.
CSPA restricts U.S. relationships with nations that use young people for military service, defining "child soldier" as anyone under 18 who participates in conflict as part of governmental armed forces, anyone under 15 who has been recruited to join state armed forces and anyone under 18 who has been recruited to be part of non-state armed forces.
The 2017 list of offenders included the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
Missing on that 2017 list, approved by Tillerson, are Iraq, Myanmar, and Afghanistan.
A confidential State Department “dissent” memo said Tillerson breached the Child Soldiers Prevention Act when he decided in June to exclude Iraq, Myanmar, and Afghanistan from a U.S. list of offenders in the use of child soldiers. This was despite the department publicly acknowledging that children were being conscripted in those countries.
Documents reviewed by Reuters show Tillerson’s decision was at odds with a unanimous recommendation by the heads of the State Department’s regional bureaus overseeing embassies in the Middle East and Asia, the U.S. envoy on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the department’s human rights office and its own in-house lawyers.
Why would Tillerson and Trump want them off the list?
Keeping the countries off the annual list makes it easier to provide them with U.S. military assistance. Iraq and Afghanistan are close allies in the fight against Islamist militants, while Myanmar is an emerging ally to offset China’s influence in Southeast Asia.
This first came to light in June although was unreported on mainstream media. Now State Department employees are confidentially speaking out.
Reuters reported in June that Tillerson had disregarded internal recommendations on Iraq, Myanmar and Afghanistan. The new documents reveal the scale of the opposition in the State Department, including the rare use of what is known as the “dissent channel,” which allows officials to object to policies without fear of reprisals.
Sources:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/child-soldiers-prevention-act-7-155613063.html