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Abducted children remain child soldiers in South Sudan: UN agency

Xinhua, March 3, 2015 Adjust font size:

The UN Children Fund ( UNICEF) on Monday said that hundreds of children seized by armed men from a village in northern South Sudan two weeks ago remain forcibly recruited as child soldiers, despite intensive efforts to locate and free them.

UNICEF said that the abduction generated fears that "they are going from the classroom to the frontline," the UN agency said in a press release, demanding their immediate release.

"UNICEF says that it now believes that the number of children might be in the hundreds -- rather than 89 as first reported," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here. " In addition, adult males were also forcibly recruited during the 15 and 16 February raid."

UNICEF said that from reports it received so far it is becoming clear the children are not together in a single group, saying that some of the children, including some of the school boys, were believed to be allowed back into their village to eat with their parents and in some instances some children were allowed to go to school. They were then taken away again at night. Endite