Item 1360 - Address by President Nelson Mandela to the Eminent Persons Group meeting on the Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children

TRANSCRIPT

Quite often, to speak of children is to invoke images of happiness, gay abandon, idealism, inquisitiveness and innocence. This is as it should be.

Even in the lowest of animal forms, basic instincts marshal adults to protect their young like the apple of their eye. Yet the irony of our age, when the achievements of science have propelled humanity to a breadth and depth of civilisation hitherto unimagined - the irony is that we have to invoke that base instinct to attain normalcy and rationality in our behaviour. It is timely - nay more, it is overdue - that humanity should mobilise all the resource at its disposal to protect children and ensure that they lead a normal, healthy and happy life.

I therefore welcome the eminent persons and experts present here today, for availing yourselves to promote this noble cause. I was personally impressed on realising how much work has already gone into the Study aimed at protecting children from the impact of armed conflict. For this, we should congratulate you all, and particularly Mrs Graca Machel for the dedication with which you have pursued this work.

As South Africans, we are proud that we could make a humble contribution to the Study, at least by hosting the Secretariat in our country. We have endeavoured over the past months to encourage the private sector to assist with the required resources; and we hope that some progress has been made in this regard.

Many years ago, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Usually, when we measure our success or otherwise in meeting these ideals, we think of democratic rights in the country as a whole; socio-economic problems and their impact on children; and such detailed issues as health, education, recreation and so on. These are in themselves, very critical concerns, and in many countries, matters of life and death.

However, it is disheartening in the extreme, to know that:

* for the 2-million children killed in armed conflict in the past decade;

* for the more than 4-million disabled;-

* for the 12 million left homeless;

* for the 10 million psychologically traumatised;

*for all these and many more children, it is more than just the weaknesses of economies or only the absence of democracy, that tear their lives apart. It is the folly of an adult population that has lost all pretences to reason, and which targets the weak and the innocent in the course of armed conflict.

We say this because, even before the modern rules of war were established, conflict was somehow managed to cause as little destruction as possible on women and children. Today, in many parts of the world where conflict rages, this is not the case. Children and civilians in general are deliberately targeted in scorched-earth policies. Teenagers barely able to judge— between right and wrong are recruited to use weapons, often as tall as themselves. Despicable weapons such as land-mines are planted indiscriminately to maim all and sundry. Children are abused in various ways as morality and reason are thrown out of the window in pursuit of selfish adult ends.

Chairperson;

We join you today, to add our voice to the call that this should come to an end. We join you in asserting that the standards which presently govern conflict are inadequate and something must be done, and done urgently to protect children in situations of conflict.

We all would prefer that, in the first instance, there should not be conflict at all. But if, for whatever reason, adults take up arms, there should be a human morality, some basic human values, that should govern the conduct of combatants. It should be a matter of principle that women and children should not be targeted. It should be a matter of course that children are not drafted into combat forces as instruments of war. It should be clearly understood that civilian populations should not be subjected to unbridled attacks.

All these and other crimes must not only be prevented. They should be punishable in the severest manner possible. And we hope that the international tribunals dealing with the latest conflicts in Central Africa and Central Europe will ensure that an example is made of those who descended to the lowest levels of barbarity.

In addressing standards, support will be required to ensure that the draft protocol on the minimum age of recruitment into armed forces becomes a norm in all countries. We further need to strengthen existing protocols regulating the use of weapons such as land-mines, let alone chemical and other weapons of mass destruction. Practices such as hostage-taking should be challenged with all the force that humanity can muster. Your Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children is one hopeful sign that the United Nations has got it in its power to bring back rationality in human relations. As we enter the new millennium, the UN faces many challenges to ensure that it asserts itself more effectively in ensuring just and equitable international relations among states, big and small. It is called upon to facilitate healthy economic relations among nations, not dictated to by the interests of a few might nations.

This Study forms an integral and urgent and critical part of the challenges of today and tomorrow. If as a result of your work, humanity is sensitised to the crisis of values and morality that underpin current conflicts; if it is spurred on to adopt measures that will eliminate diabolical practices; if indeed humanity is encouraged a step further away from conflict, then you will have done your work.

In the meantime, it is also critical that resources are mobilised far and wide to ensure recovery in those societies that have recently suffered terrible conflicts. The physical, nutritional and psychological needs of child victims, and indeed all other victims, must be attended to.

Nearer home, I wish to once more condemn in the strongest terms, the aggressive wars that the apartheid regime carried out against our neighbouring countries. We were in the same trenches with the people of Mozambique and Angola, in particular, But we do feel the remorse and profound shame for the ravages that our own country-men wrought on the economies and communities of these countries. Even if it may be misplaced, we offer our sincere apology.

Now, as a result of our struggles, freedom and justice have been attained in South Africa. And we can work together, through the Southern African Development Community and in bilateral arrangements, to correct this momentous injustice both to the people of our country and the sub-continent.

Chairperson;

Let me assure you, that in the mobilisation through which the Study wishes to bring all sectors of society into this campaign, our own people will not be found wanting.

We know what it is to suffer injustice. We know the sight of children maimed in conflict. We know of the hunger pangs in the young, so disadvantaged simply because of their colour.

We might not have witnessed the worst of such privations. But because we seek the happiness and comfort of children; because we seek a better life in a better world, we shall join hands with you to ensure that this campaign succeeds.

Thank You.