Obtained after negotiations persuading fighters to stop drafting children into their force, the release was the first time this year that a militia group has voluntarily handed over children from its ranks, according to a UNICEF official.

Humanitarian and international governmental agencies deplore the recruitment and abduction of children by armed groups looking to fill the ranks of their fighting force.

In this instance, 232 children, some as young as 13, had been recruited to fight alongside Mayi Mayi forces on Congo's volatile eastern border with Uganda and Rwanda, the official said.

The children, who belonged to three Mayi Mayi brigades, were handed over to child protection specialists after UNICEF and the children's charity Save the Children negotiated their release with the militias.

According to Pernille Ironside, a child protection specialist for UNICEF, all the children released were volunteers most likely encouraged by their families to join the Mayi Mayi, a pro-government militia operating in eastern Congo.