What has been done for child soldiers?
In January 2000, countries negotiated the text for the Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict. Its main provision is for countries to take all feasible measures to ensure children under 18 years of age do not take a direct part in hostilities. This raises the minimum age for direct participation in hostilities from the previous minimum age of 15 years. The protocol came into force in February 2002. This was a milestone in the campaign to protect children and help to prevent their use in armed conflict.
The Optional Protocol coming into force represents a great achievement, but it is not sufficient. It is part of a process which also includes getting more countries to sign up to it and to implement it by making it a part of their own domestic laws. Close monitoring and reporting will be required to make sure countries which have signed up are actually putting the ruling into force.
It is not only governments who recruit children to fight. Non-governmental armed groups (such as rebel forces) are not bound by international law in the same way as governments, so it will be harder to stop them from using child soldiers. However if they are caught using children they may face prosecution by the International Criminal Court, established in 1998, because using children under 15 in hostilities is now defined as a war crime.
There is further action that still needs to be taken. Money needs to be invested in helping more children recover from their terrible experiences and settle back into society. In the long run, money needs to go into development programmes that fight poverty so that families have enough money to live on, and children don't see joining armies as the only option for survival.