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The Independent (Banjul)
March 29, 2004
Pa Modou Bojang
Banjul
In forthright reaction to newspaper reports last month, suggesting that the
MFDC leadership was resorting to the recruitment of child soldiers into its
standing force, a senior member of the Movement has said that no such
activities by them had taken place.
Jean Bertrand Diamacoune, the national delegate of the MFDC vehemently
denied the reports, saying they were grossly misleading and painted a "very
underserved picture" of the MFDC, which is a responsible organisation
helpful and not exploitative to children.
Mr. Diamacoune told The Independent in one of MFDC's strongholds in
Casamance, that the Movement had bitterly fought years of war with the
Senegalese government without resorting to the nefarious act of recruiting
children for their operations unlike other rebel organisations across Africa
who had done so with unrestrained relish.
Jean Bertrand Diamacoune said it does not make sense to start recruiting
child soldiers now when all indications are pointing towards lasting peace
in the region. "We instead protect children who had always been left outside
our war when the conflict was harshest. Now what is the point for us if we
should recruit child-soldiers, I can only ask those who made such vile
reports" he said.
Diamacoune took the chance of press publicity to assert that the MFDC
leadership was irrevocably committed to lasting peace in Casamance where
they had fought more than twenty years of separatist war with the Senegalese
government in their bid for independence.
"This kind of misinformation can even send the wrong signals to the other
protagonists. But as far as the MFDC is concerned, there's nowhere in this
region where child-soldiers are recruited not by the MFDC anyway" he
re-emphasised. He expressed confidence that the government in Dakar was as
committed in the peace process as the MFDC leadership, who he said are
urging the governments of the neighbouring states to contribute to the
search for a final solution to the crisis.
Mr. Diamacoune also thanked both the Gambian and Bissau Guinean authorities
for giving what he called "workable" advice to President Wade that drew him
to the negotiating table.
The Casamance separatist conflict left thousands killed, injured and
displaced. Since the last peace talks six months ago, the troubled region
has experienced something of a lull in the fighting as the guns fall silent,
longer than at any one time in the past.
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