War or Life; What our Children learning?

Most children absorbed by Daesh and Taliban are used for purposes such as; spies, warriors and suicide bombers.
The most important and most effective lifetime of every human is childhood. A period in which, personality is formed. Today, the undeniable fact has proved that children at an early age (childhood) do not only need physical attention, but all of their existential dimensions including, social, emotional, personality, and intellectual should be covered.
These dimensions are the decisive and fundamental determinants of a human being that are formed since childhood. The human infant, among other beings in the world, needs the longest time to develop and reveal his/her capabilities and abilities. In fact, the human is growing and evolving in different dimensions, during the first 18 years of life, and this is a long and important time in human life.
Moreover, the human infant is much weaker than any other beings and need more care. (Consider the baby of a giraffe or the calf that stands on its feed when to be born) but the human babies cannot even keep their head for a long time. The vigilance is primarily done by parents, then by people around them, and then by the community.
One of the main issues surrounding child psychology, is growth. Growth is a multi-dimensional process. It includes physical growth, language, emotional, cognitive, social, moral, and personality development. The process of growth in a child begins with the family and to the society in which the child grows up in it, and eventually, it is the family and the community that makes the original personality of the child.
In the past, what was worrisome, was the increase of “child labor” and violence against children or being killed in clashes between the government and the armed oppositions of the government; according to reports, in the first four months of 2017, more than 1,000 children were killed and the children death toll in war had been more than 21 percent. But what is now a matter of concern, are these ‘innocent children becoming wild warriors.’

According to released reports on media, Daesh try to recruit fresh forces for itself, while simultaneously putting horror into the hearts of the people by training the children as its fighters. They use children for their terrorist and propaganda purposes, as they did the same in Syria. The rivalry between the Taliban and ISIL in Afghanistan has led both groups to seek more troops, and children are at most risk of being attracted by these scaremongering groups. Terror groups recruit the children through brainwashing and used them for their terrorist aims. Vladimir putting in a meeting with former Afghan president Hamid Karzai in 2014, had said that he believes ISIL are in 25 of the Afghanistan’s 35 provinces. In addition, the Russian envoy to Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov had earlier warned the Afghan government, neglecting ISIL’s growing proliferation in the country. Daesh (ISIL) target children under the age of 18, because children, at this age, has not yet reached the full cognitive ability of himself and the community and their minds can be easily influenced. Most children recruited by ISIL and the Taliban are used as spies, warriors, and suicide bombers. According to reports, the terror groups leave two options for families, in areas under their control: giving these terror groups one year of their income, or giving them one of their children that in most cases, families who have many children, choose the second option.

What makes the children to be attracted to these terror groups; are the poor economy of the families, lack of proper education, and a complete educational system. Throughout the school year, students learn how to read and write, but undoubtedly, cannot learn thinking and even they are unable to write a brief article about their lives and emotions or to easily speak in a crowd. This depicts the problem in our educational system, and in another direction, it is one of the main reason, innocent children are being recruited by terror groups; insecurity, as well as the government not having a complete control over the region and even leave it to terror groups, are the other reasons.

Mahdi Sarbaz – (DID) news agency
Translated by: Taher Mojab