33 B.3. Rights of the child 113. The Court must now examine the allegation regarding violations to the rights of the child. The Court has underscored that, within the general obligations to respect and guarantee rights, there are special obligations with respect to the rights of children, which are determined in function of the specific needs for their protection, whether due to their personal condition or to the specific situation in which they find themselves.172 114. Before undertaking the part of the examination that applies to the victims in this case, the Court considers it relevant to note that a child was a member of the military battalion that entered the Xamán finca on October 5, 1995. The CEH states that “the recruitment of minors was evident during the Xamán massacre (October 1995), in which 26 members of the Army participated, among them a 16-year-old adolescent who was serving at the military detachment of Rubelsanto.”173 That child is not one of the alleged victims in this case and the Court cannot examine his situation. Nonetheless, the Court repeats that the international law of human rights imposes restrictions on the recruitment of children into the Armed Forces.174 115. With respect to the alleged victims in this case, the Court recalls that it has pointed out that “cases in which the victims of violations of human rights are children take on a special seriousness.”175 The Court, in examining the circumstances in which there was an attack on a group of persons by military forces, has held that “the special vulnerability of boys and girls […] becomes even more evident […] since they are least prepared to adapt or respond to said situation and […] it is they who suffer its abuse in a disproportionate manner.”176 The Court considers that, given the characteristics of the October 5th incident, this consideration is significant.177 Therefore, given the special seriousness of the direct aggression against children by State agents, the Court holds that Guatemala did not comply with its obligation to protect boys and girls and infringed the rights of the girl and the two boys who died as a result of the massacre. B.4. Obligation to respect rights without discrimination 116. The Court must now examine whether the violations to the rights already declared are, in turn, a failure to comply with the obligations of non-discrimination governed by Article 1(1) of the Convention. 117. In the first place, the Court rejects the State’s argument that it could not have discriminated since some of its soldiers were of an indigenous background.178 That circumstance does not exempt, per se, the possibility that State action in an incident, Cf. Case of the Pueblo Bello Massacre v. Colombia, supra, para. 111 and Case of Human Rights Defender et al. v. Guatemala. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations and Costs. Judgment of August 28, 2014. Series C No. 283, para. 141. 173 CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, supra, Volume III. Human rights violations and acts of violence, p. 79. 174 Cf. Case of Vargas Areco v. Paraguay, supra, paras. 144 and 111 to 134. 175 Juridical Condition and Human Rights of the Child. Advisory Opinion OC-17/02 of August 28, 2002. Series A No. 17 and Case of the Hacienda Brasil Verde Workers v. Brazil, supra, para. 407. 176 Case of the Mapiripán Massacre v. Colombia, supra, para. 156 and Case of the Afro-descendant Communities displaced from the Rio Cacarica Basin (Operation Genesis) v. Colombia, supra, para. 327. 177 This, notwithstanding what has been stated on the lack of arguments on international humanitarian law (supra footnote 163). 178 In the public hearing of February 9, 2018, the State indicated that “most of the convicted soldiers were q'eqchís, in other words, they belonged to the same Mayan indigenous ethnic that was prevalent in the Community.” This position was included in its final written arguments. 172