Punishment attacks on youths in Northern Ireland have almost doubled since the signing of the Belfast Agreement, according to a report.
The author recommends the head of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (IICD) monitors the number of beatings and shootings by those responsible - the IRA, UDA and UVF.
Between 1990 and 2000, 372 teenagers were assaulted and 207 shot by paramilitaries in so-called "punishment" attacks, Prof Liam Kennedy of Queen's University, Belfast, states in a report published yesterday.
The report, They shoot children, don't they?, was commissioned by a cross-community group, the Northern Ireland Committee Against Terror, and was submitted to Westminster
MPs sitting on the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee.
The report breaks down RUC statistics into shootings and assaults. During 1999 and 2000, paramilitaries attacked 47 juveniles compared with 25 in the previous two years.
The youngest victim of a paramilitary shooting was 13 years old while three other children under 14 were assaulted.
Prof Kennedy insists paramilitary assaults are no less serious than paramilitary shootings. "They frequently cause more severe long-term damage, including post-traumatic stress disorder," he said.
Loyalists have been responsible for 636 paramilitary shootings since 1998, while republicans have carried out 496 such attacks.
Republicans, however, have shot more teenagers, 149 compared to the loyalist figure of 122.
In the same period Prof Kennedy says, "an even larger number of youths were subject to assaults of the kind undergone by 15-year-old George McWilliams". Since 1988, republicans have been responsible for assaulting more teenagers than loyalists - teenagers account for 30 per cent of 769 republican beatings with 23 per cent of the 737 assaults perpetrated by loyalists.
"None the less, too much should not be made of the difference between loyalist and republican practices . . . both terrorise large numbers of very young people," the report said.
Prof Kennedy calls on the government to consider imposing sanctions "on the paramilitary political parties (PUP, Sinn Fein and the UDP) whose armed wings continue to engage in the mutilation of people."
"It is clear that neither participation in power nor the advent of restorative justice schemes has served to reduce the incidence of vigilante-style shooting of young people. Contrary to some impressions, the guns have not been silent."
His report suggests Gen de Chastelain of the IICD monitors the incidence of "punishment" attacks.