U.S. report slams Turkey’s use of child soldiers

Turkey rejected the fact which says that Ankara violated the Child Soldiers Prevention Act in Libya and Syria, shortly after the U.S. State Department in its 2021 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) added Ankara to a list of countries implicated in the use of child soldiers over the past year.

The US TIP report determined that Turkey was providing "tangible support" to the Sultan Murad division in Syria, a faction of Syrian opposition that Ankara has long, supported and a group that Washington said recruited and used child soldiers.

A senior State Department official also made a reference to the use of child soldiers in Libya, saying Washington was hoping to work with Ankara on the issue to address it.

According to the State Department report, governments placed on this list are subject to restrictions, , on certain security assistance and commercial licensing of military equipment, absent a presidential waiver.

Analysts believe the move that placed a NATO ally for the first time in such a list, is likely to further complicate the already fraught ties between Ankara and Washington.

Turkey has carried out three cross-border operations in Syria against the so-called Islamic State, as well as U.S.-backed Kurdish militia and has frequently used factions of armed Syrian fighters on top of its own forces.

Some of these groups have been accused by human rights groups and the United Nations of indiscriminately attacking civilians and carrying out kidnappings and lootings.

Turkey, through proxies and its own armed forces, has also been involved in the Libyan conflict. The United Nations had asked Ankara to rein in these Syrian rebels while Turkey rejected the allegations, calling them 'baseless'.

Over 2,000 children were among Syrian rebels believed to have been deployed over the past year via Turkey in support of the Government of National Accord in Libya.

The United Nations Optional Protocol on the Convention of the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, which was opened for signature in May 2000, says, “Armed groups that are distinct from the armed forces of a State should not, under any circumstances, recruit or use in hostilities persons under the age of 18 years.”