Could prosecutors use images by Darfur’s children showing civilians under attack as evidence in a future war crimes trial?

By Rebekah Heil in London and Katy Glassborow in The Hague (AR No. 126, 14-Aug-07)

Anna Schmitt was in eastern Chad interviewing Sudanese refugees from the Darfur region when the women at a displacement camp gave her some advice.
“If you want information, you should ask the children.”

So she did just that. During her research for the non-government organisation Waging Peace, Schmitt sat in a classroom with the camp’s children, many of whom had been forced from their homes three or four years ago.

Through interpreters who spoke Arabic and the languages of Darfur, she asked the children about their hopes and dreams. Many answered that they wanted to be doctors or teachers or join the civil service.

One 16-year-old boy said, “I don’t want to become a rebel. I want to be educated and continue school, so I can help my people.”

When he was 14, his father had been killed in front of him in Darfur.

Schmitt asked the children to write down their memories when one of them asked, ‘Would we be allowed to draw instead?’

The children, between the ages of five and 18, drew pictures showing their villages full of tanks and armed men on horseback, houses ablaze and helicopters circling the skies. Read more >>>>>>>>>>>