"Digital News, Social Change & Globalization" Conference
Screening
| Title | Child Soldiers |
| Language | English with Chinese subtitles |
| Length | 45 minutes |
| Producer (HK version) | Eric Poon Tat-pui |
| Executive Producer (HK version) | Dominica Siu |
| Production | A co-production of the Oregon Public Broadcasting and the Australia Broadcasting Corporation, together with Radio Television Hong Kong |
| First showing | As part of the "Hong Kong Connection" series on Pearl channel, Television Broadcasts Ltd., June 24, 2002 |
| Awards | First prize, Chinese television category, the Seventh Human Rights Press Awards (Hong Kong) (2002) Child Rights Award 2002, Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union/Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia & UNICEF Silver World Medal in the National/International Affairs category of Television Documentary and Information Programs Division at the 2002 New York Film Festival UNESCO Bronze Medal in the 2002 New York Film Festival |
| * | The executive producer, Dominica Siu, and producer, Eric Poon, will introduce the piece and take questions after its showing. |
| Synopsis | According to the protocol of United Nation for protecting children, the UN prohibits any nations to recruit children under the age of 18 to war. However, the current number of child soldiers in the world is still increasing for about 300,000 at the moment. Warlords send kids to fight. To them, kids are just another tools of war. Kids are easy to recruit or abduct. They are cheap to keep. You can turn them into what you wish. With today’s light weapons, they could be just effective as an adult to be a soldier. Children can be trained doing thing that an adult will walk out. In the South of Sudan, the war between the government and the revolution group has been started for more than two decades. Virtually, from the first day when they fight, they used child soldiers. At the moment, more than 2,000,000 people have been killed by war. One of the greatest concentrations of child soldiers in the world is in Myanmar. The war between the government and the ethnics groups has been last for 50 years. Young people are send to war from one generation to another. And, kids are getting killed continuously. In Kitgum of Uganda, a city located in the northern border, many children were kidnapped by warlords. It is a city regards as one of the dangerous place for kids. In Sierra Leone, kids are systematically abducted to fulfill warlords’ need. Kids as young as twelve are trained to be a killing machine to commit atrocity. How can a kid be so brutal? They give them drugs. Several kids told their horrible stories in front of the camera. Inside a center for the rehabilitation in Sierra Leone, parents desperately waited for the returnees of child soldiers hoping that their child could be one of them. Some were blessed, some were not. But, no one wants to give up. In Columbia, for those children who were once a FARC, they can never be back to normal again. Not only themselves, but also their parents were threatened to be killed for they have an escapee of FARC. Some of them ended up to be criminals afterwards. In fact, some of the cases in Uganda were captured by the warlords for three times. If the war continues, they will be kidnapped again at any time, in anywhere. The two major public broadcasters in the world, the Oregon Public Broadcasting and the Australia Broadcasting Corporation, together with Radio Television Hong Kong co-produced a one-hour documentary about "Child Soldiers". |