In discussions about conflict in Africa the role of youth and minors is discussed often in a frame of victimhood. In a study funded by UNICEF, a team of researchers based at the African Studies Centre Leiden and in the Anthropology Department of the Univerisity of Bangui have tried to understand the realities behind this phenomenon of ‘child soldier’. Through life story interviews done in several regions in Central African Republic and in the capital Bangui, and through archival work they paint a picture of the history and more recent situation of children in war-zones.