Two steps forward, five steps back. That's the stuttering pace of progress in rescuing children in Democratic Republic of Congo from a life of war. For every two youngsters set free in the conflict-ravaged east, five are abducted and forced to serve again as child soldiers, according to a new Amnesty International report.

It's a depressing fact that children who have borne arms are more likely to be re-recruited. In the volatile eastern province of North Kivu, where a recent peace agreement has done little to smother violence, as many as half of former child combatants who have been reunited with their families may have been press-ganged back into service, Amnesty says.

They are abducted from schools and snatched from their homes. Children who try to escape are tortured or killed. Sometimes other children are forced to do the killing.

"The more they know, the more they are at risk of re-recruitment," says Amnesty researcher Andrew Philip. "In this case, experience can be deadly."

Congolese forces and rebels led by renegade Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda started their latest bout of fighting in late August when a January peace deal aimed at ending more than a decade of violence collapsed.

The United Nations says the conflict has driven more than 100,000 people from their homes in recent weeks - adding to the ranks of more than 830,000 North Kivu people who had already fled on-off fighting in the remote east.

It's no coincidence that recruitment of child soldiers goes hand-in-hand with other crimes under international law. The Amnesty report finds that despite the January deal that promised to end abuses, civilians are still being killed, raped, kidnapped and tortured. The perpetrators are North Kivu's militias and government troops alike.

Precise figures on sexual violence are hard to come by, but U.N. statistics from December 2007 put the number of reported rape cases in North Kivu at about 350 a month. Amnesty's anecdotal evidence suggests the scale may be much worse.

"Even infants and elderly women are amongst the victims - some of whom have been gang raped," Philip said. "Disturbingly, rapes are often committed in public and in front of family members, including children."

Amnesty's interviews and case studies make disturbing reading. They also underline just how central the human rights fight is to the revival of North Kivu's peace process.

Conventional wisdom says that to stop the abuses, first you have to stop the war. But the study suggests otherwise.

"Amnesty International believes that no further amount of mediation or facilitation will significantly advance the cause of peace in North Kivu unless, first, there is an immediate and unequivocal halt to violations and abuses of international human rights and humanitarian law," the report says.

"The priority of the international community must therefore be to convince all armed forces present in the Kivus to abide immediately by international human rights standards or face justice."

That won't happen, of course, until Congo gets its own institutions in order. That means rehabilitation of its courts and police so abuses can be investigated and prosecuted. It means ending a culture of impunity and providing psychological and emotional support to victims.

"One of the factors leading to a resurgence of any conflict is the distinct failure to adequately address issues affecting survivors of rape and other forms of sexual violence," said Heather Harvey, who manages Amnesty International UK's Stop Violence Against Women campaign.

"The Democratic Republic of Congo government must urgently consult with women and women-led organisations to develop effective mechanisms which would protect women and girls from ongoing sexual violence and restore stability to the community."

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