Innocence Under Siege: Healing a Scarred Generation

For 20 million children worldwide, childhood--which should be a time of innocence and fun--is increasingly marked by violence, as many are used as targets in the world's civil, tribal, and ethnic wars. Innocence Under Siege surveys the horrific effects of war on children, with particular emphasis on the 1994 tribal wars in Rwanda and the civil war in West Africa's Sierra Leone. In these two conflicts, parents have been systematically slaughtered, and children abducted--with boys being trained as killers, girls raped or pressed into sexual slavery, and both used as human shields, with the result that many children are now amputees. In Rwanda, 80,000 children were orphaned, with entire villages often left with only children to raise themselves with little means of financial support and no adult role models. In Sierra Leone, a cunning psychological warfare was employed, as kids were forced to kill family members, leaving the children with feelings of guilt and shame. As well as presenting a devastating portrait of cruelty and woe, this program also describes efforts to heal this scarred generation, ranging from short-range goals (such as building a safety zone in which kids feel secure; not an easy task, since returning soldiers infiltrate villages to settle old scores) to longer-range goals of learning skills necessary to put food on the table once a culture of peace is established. Disappointingly, no mention is made of the new threat of terrorism, or the recent suicide bombings in the Middle East that have thinned the ranks of Arab youth. A provocative but incomplete study, this is recommended, overall, for large academic and public libraries, but graphic images of death and violence make this inappropriate for secondary school collections. Aud: C, P. (S. Rees)