Nepal’s government has agreed to release nearly 3,000 children who were recruited by communist rebels to wage the country’s insurgency, a UN official said on Friday.
Nepali Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal agreed to discharge 2,975 minors, who have been living with thousands of other former combatants in UN-monitored camps since a 2006 ceasefire, said Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN secretary-general’s special representative for children and armed conflict.
The former child soldiers will be given vocational and educational training to help them reintegrate into society, and attempts will be made to trace their families and reunite them, Coomaraswamy said.
He added that the process is expected to be completed by February.
The former rebels, formally known as the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), gave up their armed rebellion in 2006 and joined a peace process. They contested May elections this year for the country’s lawmaking Constituent Assembly and emerged as the largest political party.
Their leader is now the prime minister of a coalition government that was set up in August.
During their 10 years of fighting government troops, the Maoists were repeatedly accused of recruiting minors to join their ranks.
They initially denied the accusations, but UN arms monitors identified 2,975 minors among the thousands of former rebel combatants living in the camps.
Most older former combatants are expected to join the country’s security forces, but the process has been delayed by the main opposition party, Nepali Congress, which opposes the plan.
Separately, a former rebel group in Sri Lanka also agreed this week to stop child conscription and release more than 60 underage combatants, the UN said on Thursday.
The Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal militia pledged to free all child combatants within three months and reintegrate them into society, UNICEF said. Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger rebels have also been accused of recruiting child soldiers.
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