ReliefWeb

1. INTRODUCTION: RATIONALE OF RESEARCH

In November 2015 – January 2016, the team of the DRC social and legal protection program held a number of meetings with the representatives of various governmental services in the north of the Region of Donetsk (cities of Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka, and Krasnyi Lyman) in order to obtain general information on the situation with children’s protection in the region in the aftermath of the conflict.
The data collected showed that the conflict in the Eastern Ukraine has added a new vulnerability dimension with regard to a group of children who were considered a specific risk group even before the conflict.
A common practice in Ukraine is that 16-18-year-old adolescents after the 9th year of general secondary school enter vocational educational institutions (VEIs) in other cities, where they live at dormitories - in an unfamiliar place away from their family, unattended by parents or other adults. In conflict-affected areas, VEI students, boys and girls aged 16-18, especially those who come from the currently uncontrolled territory without their parents, form a particularly vulnerable group with a high risk of involvement in armed forces/groups or sexual exploitation.
Currently, 44 VET institutions operate in conflict-affected areas with about 13,500 adolescent students. According to statistics as of January 2016, only 79 of 179 adolescents who are internallydisplaced people (IDP) and attend VEIs in the Region of Donetsk, received the IDP status, while others failed to obtain the status due to documentation issues or other legal matters related to their status of unaccompanied or separated minors.
The information that boys come to checkpoints with requests to join the army was reported to the Children’s Affairs Service. In several cases the people at checkpoints asked the Service to pick up the children.
VEIs in the Region of Donetsk are largely limited in resources and cannot offer an adequate protective environment and support for their students. There are not enough leisure options for young people beyond learning. In the framework of humanitarian programs in response to the emergency due to the conflict in Eastern Ukraine, the adolescents are a neglected group as the vast majority of activities for children’s protection in emergencies were focused on children of pre-school and primary school age.
The problem of children’s involvement in the armed conflict in Ukraine was hardly touched upon by the media prior to 2016, with the exception of periodic anecdote publications.
In January 2016, in his speech in the Ivan Bohun Kyiv Military Lyceum during the “Lessons of Courage,” the President of Ukraine stated that: “As of the end of the year there are 21 young people under the age of 18 and 650 people aged 18 to 25 years among those who defended our country and were killed in the east of Ukraine. The youngest of them, 17-year-old Nazar Yakubowskyi from Khmelnytskyi, still a child, went to the front within the volunteer battalion in the first few months of the conflict”.
This statement drew the attention of the NGO Coalition “Children’s Rights in Ukraine” (in which the Danish Refugee Council actively participates) and was seen as a kind of promotion of the children’s participation in hostilities as an act of patriotism and even heroism. The Coalition sent an open letter to the President of Ukraine with a request to clarify the situation with the involvement of the mentioned adolescents in hostilities and to take certain measures (see Appendix 6).
According to the Convention on the Rights of the Child ratified by Decree No. 789-XII of the Verkhovna Rada on February 27, 1991, “... a child is every human being under 18 years of age...”. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict establishes that States Parties “shall take all feasible measures to ensure that members of their armed forces who have not attained the age of 18 years do not take a direct part in hostilities.” In addition, the Optional Protocol also obliges States Parties to take all feasible measures to prevent the recruitment and use in hostilities of persons under the age of 18 years by armed groups that are distinct from the armed forces of a State. Such measures shall include legal measures necessary to prohibit and criminalize such practices.
Moreover, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in its Concluding Observations adopted in 2011 welcomed Ukraine’s signing in 2007 of the Paris Commitments to protect children from unlawful recruitment or use by armed forces or armed groups and Paris Principles and Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces or Armed Groups. At the same time, the Committee recommended Ukraine “[...] to take measures to provide for the clear and unambiguous prohibition by the Criminal Code and criminal liability for the violation of the provisions of the Optional Protocol regarding the recruitment and use of children in hostilities”. In addition, the Committee recommended bringing all military codes, manuals, standards, operating procedures, and other military documents and directives in line with the provisions and spirit of the Optional Protocol.
As of today, the Government of Ukraine took certain steps to bring the national legislation in line with the Optional Protocol. 2 For example, Art. 30 of the Law of Ukraine “On the Protection of Childhood”3 directly specifies the prohibition in Ukraine of the children’s participation in hostilities or armed conflicts, the creation of children's military organizations and units, as well as propaganda of war and violence among children. In January 2016, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted the Law “On Amendments to Certain Laws of Ukraine Concerning the Strengthening of Children’s Protection and Support of Families with Children”, which defines the children affected by hostilities and classifies the action, i. e. the involvement of children in hostilities. The amendments define that “a child affected by hostilities and armed conflicts is a child who was wounded, contused, injured, suffered physical or psychological abuse, was taken outside Ukraine, was involved in military formations or held illegally captive as a result of hostilities or armed conflicts.” However, the Criminal Code of Ukraine contains no clear definition of the term “involvement of children in armed forces/groups” and does not criminalize the recruitment, involvement, and other forms of use of children in armed forces or armed groups.
At the time of the research, by February 2016, a serious gap was observed in the information and analysis of the current situation with regard to risk factors, cases, and consequences of the children’s involvement in the armed conflict in Ukraine.