Colombo: Tamil Tiger guerrillas recruited child soldiers amid a truce with the Sri Lankan government, but the overall ceasefire violations were going down, Scandinavian monitors said.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) forcibly enlisted boys and girls amid the ceasefire, said the Scandinavian monitoring team, which is known as the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM).

"The SLMM is still receiving complaints about child recruitment of the LTTE, and even though their numbers have clearly been going down in the last months, SLMM would like to see an immediate end to this practice," the monitors said in a statement.

They also said they had noticed a drop in the number of ceasefire violations by both sides and described it as a "positive and ongoing development".

"The same downward trend can also be seen in the number of received complaints about child recruitment of the LTTE, where complaints went down from more than 60 in September to 38 in November and down to 28 in December."

The LTTE has been severely criticised for their practice of recruiting children below the age of 18 years despite an assurance to the United Nations special representative on children in armed conflict, Olara Ottunu, not to have child soldiers in Tiger ranks.

The Tigers have earlier denied recruiting children, but later admitted that under- aged youngsters had joined them without disclosing their actual age. However, human rights groups have accused the rebels of systematic recruitment of children and some as young as nine years, into LTTE cadres.

PTI