Children affected by conflict overview

The AU Policy on PCRD underscores the importance of addressing the specific needs of children affected by conflict, an area that most experts agree requires further interrogation. In line with this, and with the need to give effect to the provisions of the AU Convention on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (as well as UN Convention on the Rights of the Child; Optional Protocol II to the CRC on the involvement of children in armed conflict, the Geneva Conventions and other international instruments), the AU PSD and the UN Economic Commission for Africa have requested the assistance of Pax Africa in developing a continental policy on children affected by conflict.

Such a policy would: protect children from the effects of conflict and prevent their direct involvement in conflict; enhance the capacity of the AU, RECs and Member States to respond to the specific needs of children affected by conflict; broaden the participation of youth in peace processes and PCRD; and the re-emergence of conflict by rehabilitating and reintegrating children into societies, helping them to resume their lives as children and providing opportunities for them to become productive citizens.

Because of the large number of children affected by conflict in Africa, this issue has been prioritised by the AU for policy development and a pilot programme in support of former child soldiers has commenced in the Great Lakes Region.