Today, Seyaj agreed with the Commander of the 1st Armored Division and the Northwestern Military Region, Major General Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar, to develop and implement a joint time plan for the demobilization, rehabilitation, and reintegration of recruits suspected of being under the age of 18.
As part of its campaign to combat child recruitment, Seyaj called on UNICEF Yemen to supervise and support efforts to carry out the decision of the Commander of the First Armored Division and the Northwestern Military Region, Major General Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar, to demobilize 100 soldiers, as the first staggered batch of recruited children.
This ruling comes in response to Seyaj’s campaign against child recruiting, and it is a tangible gesture from the military commander to show his commitment to implementing international regulations and decisions concerning child soldiers.
Today, Sunday, the military judge Abdullah Al-Hadri, head of the military prosecution in the 1st Armored Division’s northwest military region, confirmed in his meeting with Ahmed Al-Qorashi, the organization’s leader, that the division has started demobilizing child soldiers from its ranks and that it is currently conducting medical exams for all personnel who are suspected of being minors.
During his visit to Seyaj headquarters, Colonel Al-Hadri reaffirmed his readiness to cooperate in all rehabilitation and reintegration programs in accordance with the Paris Principles and other charters. Meanwhile, Ahmed al-Qorashi thanked the leadership of the First Armored Division for its positive response and willingness to abide by and implement legislation. He emphasized that Seyaj intends to work hard in the coming period, in collaboration with UNICEF, to establish demobilization, rehabilitation, and integration programs for recruits under the age of 18.
At the discussion, which took place at the organization’s headquarters, the two parties decided to work together to fulfill the campaign’s aims of demobilizing and rehabilitating child soldiers. The group reaffirmed its call for Yemen’s military and security system to adopt comparable practical actions to assure the release of child soldiers, monitor the trend, and implement rehabilitation and integration programs to allow recruits to resume their regular civilian lives.
Seyaj, Sana’a 11-11-2011