Sudan’s Founding Alliance (TASIS) accused the Port Sudan-based SAF junta and allied militias of recruiting underage boys to fight, alleging multiple child detainees were captured after clashes in Kordofan on Wednesday.
Alaa al-Din Awad Naqd, a TASIS spokesperson, said in a statement that primary and middle-school pupils told interrogators SAF officers and “militant battalions” were forcing households to provide one recruit regardless of age.
Naqd cited what he described as a decision by the juntas education minister to exempt students who fight, and children of those killed, from school fees as further evidence of coercion. He also referred to videos purportedly showing minors at rallies with Islamist chants and slogans of the dissolved National Congress Party.
TASIS urged political actors, civil society groups and international organisations to condemn the practice and spotlight what it called crimes against Sudanese children.
There was no immediate comment from Port Sudan junta. Recruiting children under 18 into armed conflict is prohibited under international law.
