“We will follow up on every case. If there is one person, we will hand him over to his family. We are looking into their documents. If they are one day underage, we will not accept them,” said Egid Agiri, an SDF commander.
In 2019, SDF General Commander Mazloum Abdi signed an action plan with the United Nations to end the practice. The year before, the UN reported 415 children within the ranks of various Kurdish forces operating under the umbrella of the SDF - the People's Protection Units (YPG) and their all-female counterparts the YPJ, and the internal security forces (Asayish).
Since the action plan was signed, more than 200 child soldiers have been located and returned to their homes, according to Khalid Cebir, co-chair of the independent Child Protection Office, which was created in 2020 to facilitate returning child soldiers to their families.
The 54 children who went home on Sunday were aged between 15 and 17 years. Dozens more families are waiting for news of their children, said Cebir.
The recruitment and use of child soldiers is a problem across all sides of the Syrian conflict. In 2020, the UN documented the recruitment and use of 813 children by jihadists, Turkish-backed militias, Kurdish forces under the SDF, opposition groups, pro-government militias, and regime forces.
Video editing by Sarkawt Mohammed
