Obama Waives Curbs on Aid to Countries Using Child Soldiers

[Freddie Stubbs]

Source: Democracy Now

President Obama has decided to issue a waiver allowing continued U.S. military aid to four countries that use child soldiers for the second consecutive year. The Obama administration says it will waive penalties under the Child Soldiers Prevention Act to prevent a cutoff of military assistance to Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and Yemen. According to Foreign Policy magazine, National Security Council Senior Director Samantha Power had promised NGOs last year that the waivers would not be renewed, saying the administration would exert pressure by " from inside the tent." President Obama has decided to issue a waiver allowing continued U.S. military aid to four countries that use child soldiers for the second consecutive year. The Obama administration says it will waive penalties under the Child Soldiers Prevention Act to prevent a cutoff of military assistance to Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and Yemen. According to Foreign Policy magazine, National Security Council Senior Director Samantha Power had promised NGOs last year that the waivers would not be renewed, saying the administration would exert pressure by " from inside the tent."

Read more: http://www.democracynow.org/2011/10/5/headlines/obama_waives_curbs_on_aid_to_countries_using_child_soldiers

[Nuclear Unicorn]

1. I feel sick n/t

[tblue]

2. Why am I not surprised?

[xchrom]

3. ...

:eyes:

[aquamarina]

4. New reality - if it's bad it must be good.

[ProSense]

5. Here is Human Rights Watch's release:

US: Don’t Finance Child Soldiers

Obama Administration Aid Waivers Undercut US Law

(New York) – The US government should reverse its decision to continue military assistance to governments using child soldiers, Human Rights Watch said today. On October 4, 2011, the Obama administration announced waivers to the Child Soldiers Prevention Act, allowing military assistance to Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Yemen despite the continued use of children in their armed forces.

<...>

The Child Soldiers Prevention Act went into effect in 2010. President Barack Obama issued waivers in October to allow four affected countries – Chad, Congo, Sudan, and Yemen – to continue to receive military aid, contending that the countries were “on notice” and needed time to address their child soldiers problem. The president’s new determination allows three of the same countries to receive continued aid.

<...>

The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo will continue to receive US military training and other assistance, even though it has hundreds of child soldiers in its armed forces and has failed to cooperate with the United Nations in setting up a formal demobilization plan. Some army commanders have actively blocked efforts to demobilize children from their units. Officers known to recruit child soldiers – including Bosco Ntaganda, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court – have been promoted and serve openly in the army’s command.

The administration is withholding approximately US$1.3 million in foreign military financing from Congo until the government meets certain benchmarks, including signing a UN action plan to end its use of child soldiers, providing UN inspection teams access to military installations, and removing and prosecuting commanders that recruit children. The new waivers will allow other applicable assistance, including military training, to continue.

more

[FedUp_Queer]

13. If you read the whole release, it's even worse than the article in the OP.

http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/10/04/us-don-t-finance-child-soldiers

[alp227]

6. EVERYTHING the administration has done is a disappointment!

caving on health care reform/taxes. Trusting a Breitbart smear to fire Shirley Sherrod. Not closing Guantanamo. Caving in to Republicans on the debt. Soft on debt collectors. and now THIS.

(edit) Just a day or 2 ago ny times reported "Foreign Aid Set to Take a Hit in U.S. Budget Crisis"...why couldn't aid to war crime/child soldier countries?

[Nuclear Unicorn]

8. But we got DADT repealed. At least those will be adult soldiers getting shot-up

:sarcasm:

[Freddie Stubbs]

10. Are you disappointed that the Justice Department is not defending DOMA in court?

[FedUp_Queer]

12. If they gave such a crap about us gays...

they'd actually be working to repeal DOMA.

[Freddie Stubbs]

15. If you can figure out how to get the GOP-controlled House to do that,

I would be interested to hear it.

[FedUp_Queer]

16. Right after you tell me how we get a democratically controlled house to do so.

[Freddie Stubbs]

17. Elect more Democrats who support repeal of DOMA

[emilyg]

7. Disgusting.

[russspeakeasy]

9. Are you deaf, sir ?

[gratuitous]

11. How in thrall is the United States to the High Church of Redemptive Violence?

We can't even cut off military aid to countries that conscript children. THAT's our national religion. We believe in war and violence, militarism and its power to set all wrongs to right. We'll even put guns into the hands of children, that's how fervently we believe in war. We're not just "inside the tent," we ARE the tent, we are War, Inc.

[Autumn]

14. We need a new platform for the "new democrats"

just so we know what they stand for. Seems like the old values don't quite fit.

[Dragonfli]

18. All you have to do is change the name on the 1988 Republican platform, summarizes 3rd way ideals nt

[Little Tich]

19. Link to Presidential Memorandum

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/10/04/presidential-memorandum-child-soldiers-prevention-act-2008

I don't understand the reasons for this waiver at all. These countries apart from maybe Tchad, are up to no good. But even Tchad must be closely supervised so that it really discontinues this awful practice.

[bhikkhu]

22. The Wh information explains the reasons very well

...Chad gets a waiver because it has cooperated with the UN fully on the issue, has turned over underage military recruits, and has no reported new underage recruits in the past year.

The DRC gets a partial waiver. The situation there sounds more complex and fragmented, and the UN made limited progress. The partial waiver consists of zero support in armaments and aid, but continued support in training their military toward professionalism, the rule of law, the Geneva Convention protocols, and general support of civil society and human rights. Its the least we can do, and it is worth doing (though, like many other similar things, its hard to see how we get anything out of it).

Yemen is a special case of a screwed up failing country where we are mired in a questionable "war on terror". Considering all that is going on there, its hard to say whether we should be in farther or all the way out, but the recruitment of children is a small issue (unfortunately), with all the factions and failure going on. I suspect it will wind up like Afghanistan eventually, where the floor falls out from under civil society and war becomes general, whatever we do or don't do.

[Vicar In A Tutu]

23. That makes sense.

These things are never as cut and dried as they initially appear.

[Little Tich]

24. Thanks, I feel a little wiser now.

[treestar]

26. Yep considering both sides of a question

is always good before passing judgment. If there are to be no waivers at all, the Congress needs to pass a law that does not include the possibility of waivers.

[Bluenorthwest]

28. Recruitment of child soldiers is something you can call a small

issue? Wow. This to defend a President who claims that two gay people wanting to marry is a huge issue, involving God in the mix and Sanctity and all manner of language.
The President's alleged 'messiah' said that anyone who harms so much as a hair on a child's head is doomed. Chew on that. He waves his religion at me, I can do the same in return. Better a millstone should be tied around their necks than that which awaits those who harm even a hair.

[bhikkhu]

29. Reading comprehension - in Yemen, where civil society is in the midst of collapse,

the recruitment of child soldiers is not the biggest issue. They haven't done well on the issue, but the withdrawal of US support would likely (at least in the analyses I have read) lead to the loss of the government and a decent into a fragmented tribal/medieval state of regular war and deprivation, such as Somalia enjoys. That would be worse for the kids.

[russspeakeasy]

20. Just try to imagine him saying this as a first term candidate...

I can't either....His balls shrank considerably once he got elected.

[COLGATE4]

21. I don't think it was balls - his campaign schtick shrank.

[russspeakeasy]

27. You make a good point.

[treestar]

25. If the law allows for these waivers

Then the law must have considered there would be instances in which the waiver might be needed.