Institute works on the treatment of children allegedly involved with terrorist groups
Military and law enforcement officers carrying out operations against Boko Haram in Nigeria and neighbouring countries such as Niger, Chad and Cameroon have increasingly been capturing children who appear to be allegedly involved with the terrorist organisation as offenders, victims, or witnesses.
These children face a high risk of being killed, detained, or subjected to the criminal justice process without consideration of their young age. It is not unusual for them to be victims and perpetrators of particularly serious crimes simultaneously as they are used as tools of war.
Working to improve conditions
This is the reason why the Danish Institute for Human Rights organised, in collaboration with the Terrorism Prevention Branch of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), a Sub-regional workshop on the treatment of children allegedly involved with terrorist groups, in particular Boko Haram in Dakar, Senegal. The workshop falls under a strategic partnership on human rights responses to terrorism in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The workshop’s purpose was to facilitate policy dialogue between the authorities in Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon to address these challenges. Representatives of police and other law enforcement agencies, prosecution services, judiciary, child protection agencies, and communities affected by the recruitment of children by terrorist groups and armed forces were brought together. They exchanged information on the rights of children suspected of terrorism related offences and discussed ways to ensure the full application and implementation of international standards and norms regarding children in contact with the justice system, whether as offenders, victims, or witnesses.
“The notion of sovereignty presupposes not only that a state has the right to manage its own affairs within its national jurisdiction but it also gives to the state primary responsibility for protecting the people within its borders especially marginalised or vulnerable individuals or communities,’’ Philippe-Emmanuel Draut, senior adviser at the Danish Institute for Human Rights explains.
International law must be respected
The workshop combined UNODC’s ability to deliver training on human rights and criminal justice responses to violent extremism with the institute’s methodology, partnership concept and contextual approach to institutional capacity building and policy advocacy work.
Ulrich Garms of UNODC, highlighted the importance of the conclusions adopted by the officials from the four countries most affected by Boko Haram's terrorist acts.
"The participants from Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria affirmed that international law must be respected when dealing with children associated with Boko Haram and that it is of fundamental importance that those children should be primarily considered and treated as victims of a violation of the international normative framework concerning the association of children with armed forces and armed groups," Garms says.
The Danish Institute for Human Rights provides technical assistance to criminal justice and law enforcement officers in West Africa with special attention to vulnerable and marginalised individuals or groups and it is under the UNODC mandate to support Member States to prevent crime and violence and ensure that children are better protected by the justice system.
Finding common ground
As part of the Danish Institute for Human Rights' focus on counter-terrorism, the Special Rapporteur on Prisons, Conditions of Detention and Policing in Africa andthe African Policing Civilian Oversight Forum (APCOF), held a panel discussion on Counter-terrorism and Human Rights Compliant Policing: Challenges and Prospects on the margins of the 57thOrdinary Session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights.
The panel discussion underlined the importance of a human rights approach to policing in the context of countering terrorism. The Danish Institute for Human Rights set out the basic elements in a human rights approach to preventing and combating terrorism, which was described as important to promoting a ‘sustainable’ fight against terrorism that addresses the root causes and not just the symptoms of insecurity.