Time and again, Denis Okwonga was confronted with countless mangled bodies, which covered the blood-spattered ground. Scenes like this had become commonplace for the 14-year-old child soldier, forced to fight in the civil war in Uganda that has now raged for 20 years.

Twelve-year-old Christopher Okello, his brother and father were working in the family’s small field, tending crops of green vegetables, maize and cassava, outside a displacement camp in Northern Uganda. They had no idea the rebels were near and had no time to escape or defend themselves.

In the middle of the night, Ida Aryamo hid in bushes outside the rebels’ camp, her 8-month-old baby clutched in her arms. It started raining and then stopped and then started again. After a long night, Ida and her son, Innocent, were rescued by a woman after they made it out to a nearby road.

The whole family was in misery – weeping and mourning for Arach Kevin, who they had heard had been killed by rebels. And then one day, then-12-year-old child soldier escaped the Ugandan rebel forces that had abducted her at age 10 and returned to the resettlement camp in Paicho, Uganda.