Issue No. 787

Children in Somalia's Wars

Between 2010 and 2016, over 6,000 Somali children were forcibly recruited into armed groups, and 2,000 in 2018 alone — the highest number recorded globally. Some were as young as 8. Since the collapse of the state in the early 1990s, Somalia has served as an example of how instability and social fragmentation can fuel the exploitation of children in conflict. Today, Al-Shabaab is widely regarded as the most culpable of Somalia's myriad armed forces for their indoctrination and abduction of children into their ranks.

Decades of instability and insecurity in Somalia have brought about particularly severe tolls on successive generations of children. For many, extreme violence and its consequences have been normalised as part of the social fabric of their daily lives. Armed conflict has been the norm, not the exception, with mass displacement, lack of schooling, and cyclical humanitarian crises all products of the internecine warfare that has troubled Somalia. 

Though children were deployed on multiple sides in the brutal inter-clan conflicts of the 1990s, Al-Shabaab is currently responsible for the vast majority of violent child exploitation in Somalia. The jihadist group entrenched across much of central-southern Somalia continues to forcibly recruit children, both boys and girls, as a form of tax on the communities it controls. In turn, the training that the boys undergo is often brutal, blending religious indoctrination alongside combat instruction. As part of this 'education,' some have been reported to have been made to watch suicide bombings. For Al-Shabaab, manipulating these children is often relatively straightforward. Isolated from their families and denied access to formal education, these children are conditioned to view their commanders as surrogate parents and to seek their validation. It is not solely through forced recruitment that young boys join Al-Shabaab, however. With few economic opportunities, some turn towards the extremists and other armed groups for financial, not ideological, reasons. For these children, survival often takes over, and they are forced to grow up quickly, acquiring skills and responsibilities that exceed their age.

Meanwhile, abducted girls are typically used for domestic roles as well as forced marriages to fighters. Women and girls are rarely deployed in combat roles by Al-Shabaab, barring some notable exceptions, such as the blind female suicide bomber who killed the mayor of Mogadishu in 2019. However, the participation of those under 18 in conflict is not solely limited to picking up arms on the frontlines; it incorporates a broader range of roles, including messengers or spies. For instance, Al-Shabaab's much-feared secret service, known as the Amniyaat, has long incorporated children into its networks for their ability to go undetected and overlooked by the security services.

In 2022, the ma'awiisley uprising of clans in central Somalia against the jihadist group was in part driven by Al-Shabaab's 'taxtortion' that included a levy of young boys for fighting. The Hawaadle and other clans in Hiiraan, Middle Shabelle, and Galmudug pushed the extremists out of significant parts of their territory, though these gains have been steadily rolled back by Al-Shabaab. Following the liberation of these areas, Al-Shabaab's child recruitment-- boys for fighting and girls for wives-- briefly declined as a result. However, since the militants have retaken many of the villages and towns, child recruitment into their ranks has resumed once again.

Some controversies would emerge with the ma'awiisley retaking land, though, with a handful of the children and wives of Al-Shabaab members or alleged supporters targeted in liberated villages. For instance, in Bulobuurde in Hiiraan in late 2022, a 14-year-old boy was killed due to his father's purported support for the jihadists. While some ma'awiisley leaders had initially not explicitly discouraged the targeting of civilians affiliated with Al-Shabaab, following a spate of these attacks, then-Hiiraan Governor and Hawaadle leader Ali Osman Jeyte instructed his forces not to target civilians. With military operations having resumed in Hiiraan, albeit at a far smaller scale, concerns have been raised about the possible targeting of civilians. 

Though the instances of child soldiers being used in the Somali National Army (SNA) or regional Daraawiish are far fewer, they still face particular risks from government authorities. In Puntland, for example, children accused of affiliation with Al-Shabaab have been executed with minimal due process. Far from addressing the root causes of child recruitment, these incidents violate international law, including the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which explicitly prohibits the execution of individuals under the age of 18, which Somalia ratified in 2015.

Breaking the cycle of child recruitment in Somalia requires more than military responses or penal measures—it needs a shift in addressing the root causes that make children vulnerable to exploitation. As long as economic hardship, lack of education, and conflict persist, armed groups will continue to manipulate and deploy them as weapons. A lasting solution must prioritise rehabilitation over retribution.

The Somali Wire Team