Al Qaeda Expanding Recruitment Of Children

CBS) Written for CBSNews.com by Farhan Bokhari, reporting from Islamabad. Al Qaeda has successfully established a network for recruiting boys as young as 12 from across central Asia as it seeks new volunteers to enlarge its team of prospective suicide bombers and militants fighters, senior security officials from the Middle East have revealed to CBS News.

---

News of al Qaeda venturing into the former Soviet central Asian republics with a population that has a largely Muslim heritage marks a significant addition to reports earlier this year that the hardline group had recruited young boys in the Pak-Afghan border region. Last May, a senior Pakistani security official showed a rare video clip to CBS News documenting a boy, barely 12 years old, using a machete to severe the head of a middle-aged man whom militants probably suspected as being a spy for the U.S. In an execution which typified the Taliban brand of quick justice, that boy severed the head of his victim who was completely tied up and thrown on the ground as a crowd of hundreds of spectators cheered. More...