(The Guardian) – Eric Mamboué tells a story that goes to the heart of what it means to be a child soldier, perfectly capturing the anomaly of a term that applies to tens of thousands of children and teenagers across the world. The Burkinabé head of War Child UK’s operations in Central African Republic describes a 14-year-old boy who had joined one of the so-called anti-balaka (anti-machete) militias and become close to its leader, a man said to have mystical powers that meant bullets could not harm him. “The boy felt very powerful being with this chief, until one day they were fighting against some of the Minusca [UN peacekeepers] and his chief was killed,” Mamboué said on the phone from the capital, Bangui.
