FARC is recruiting indigenous children as spies in Colombia’s southern jungles, the military said Wednesday.
Children as young as 13 have been found gathering intelligence for the FARC´s 44th Front in the Guaviare department, said General Jorge Suarez, commander of the army’s 22nd Brigade.
The army recently found one 13-year-old girl from the Nukak indigenous group forced to provide local intelligence to FARC troops. According to Vice President Francisco Santos, the girl was unarmed and said the FARC had forcibly recruited her two months ago.
The military delivered the girl to the national child protection agency, Suarez said.
Vice President Santos called the FARC’s recruitment of minors “a disgrace.”
The FARC has previously been known to forcibly recruit minors. According to army commander General Freddy Padilla, of the approximately 4,339 FARC soldiers who have demobilized since 2002, 656 were minors.