Khartsyzk, Ukraine---He is only 14 but already knows how to assemble a Kalashnikov rifle. Denis is a child soldier in the making -- eager to join the pro-Russian militants fighting Ukrainian troops.
"If I were an adult, I would fight," the skinny boy with a dishevelled crew-cut said in a war-scarred town deep in the heart of the rebel-run east of the ex-Soviet state.
"I want to see war, to learn how to shoot, to see the tanks," he said with an air of excitement as two adult rebels stood nodding at his side.
The UN children's agency said in January it had no proof of minors being used in one of Europe's bloodiest and most diplomatically-charged conflicts since the end of the Cold War.
UNICEF believes that about 250,000 children are being exploited in wars fought across nearly two dozen countries -- many of them in Africa.
But the Western-backed leaders in Kiev accuse the rebels of training a small army of child soldiers in schools under their control.
About 20 kids between the ages of 14 and 19 are still taking training lessons in the town of Khartsyzk -- home to 60,000 people prior to the breakout of hostilities and a flood of migrants for safer regions that followed -- in the first weeks of their summer break.
Some like Denis are learning basic drills. But his parents are understandably wary after being trapped in fighting that has killed 6,500 and shows few signs of abating 15 months on.
"They do not talk about the war with me. They hate it," Denis said. "They do not even watch the news."
Others like 17-year-old Alina are taking first aid lessons provided by the rebel command.
"We are still children and not ready to go to the front," she conceded.
"But if something were to happen, I would be able to help out."
AFP
