Uganda hands over child soldiers

Officials in Uganda have handed over more than one-hundred-and-sixty child soldiers from the Democratic Republic of Congo to the United Nations.

They were among a group of nearly seven-hundred people who had been flown from the Congolese border town of Bunia for military training in Uganda.

The children, aged between nine and seventeen, will spend the next three weeks at a camp run by the charity, World Vision, before being sent home.

The head of the UN children's agency UNICEF in Uganda said the use of child soldiers in the region could only prolong the vicious circle of violence. But a Ugandan minister, Ruhakana Rugunda, said the children had been relocated to Uganda with the consent of their parents and for their own safety.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service