Chad signs deal to demobilise child soldiers

By Stephanie Hancock

N'DJAMENA (Reuters) - Chad pledged on Wednesday to work to demobilise hundreds of child soldiers fighting in the ranks of the government army and rebel groups across the conflict-torn central African country.

President Idriss Deby's government made the commitment in an agreement signed with the United Nations children's agency UNICEF. It had previously denied allegations it was using children to fight rebels opposed to Deby.

But at a "Free Children from War" conference organised by UNICEF in France in February, African governments including Chad said they would try to rid their countries of underage fighters.

A recent investigation by UNICEF found 300 children, many as young as 8 and 11, serving in government military forces in the central Chadian town of Mongo alone.

Relief workers saw this as just the "tip of the iceberg" in a country which has experienced waves of violence in recent months, the result both of domestic rebellion and of spillover from the war in neighbouring Sudan's Darfur region.

"There are clearly a considerable number of children" under arms in Chad, said Steve Adkisson, head of UNICEF in Chad.

He said the organisation would work with the Chadian authorities to try to conduct a census across the landlocked country of children fighting, not only on the government side but also for Chadian and Sudanese rebel groups.

Adkisson said the demobilisation process would be complicated: "This isn't simply a question of identifying individual children and liberating them from the armed forces.