An undated image from a video released by the U.S. military claims to show an al Qaeda in Iraq training operation involving child recruits. Graphic source: AP Photo/US Military
Al Qaeda has said to have successfully established a network for recruiting boys as young as 12 from across central Asia according to senior security officials from the Middle East and as revealed to CBS News.
Last May, a senior Pakistani security official screened a 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 suspected of being a spy for the U.S.
The central Asian nations, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, appear to be the most likely areas to recruit AQ adherents because of lack of Coalition presence and the largely Muslim population.
The anonymous security spokesperson indicated that there are "maybe a few hundred such cases."
With the Coalition pressing in on AQ in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the organization is seeking areas of less resistance.
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