The Dallaire Institute releases its 2022-2023 annual report, the first since its new strategic plan
Since releasing its strategic plan for 2022-2025 last year, the Dallaire Institute has trained 2,981 security sector actors, building their capacity to prevent the recruitment and use of children in armed violence.
In its newly released annual report covering April 2022 - March 2023, the Dallaire Institute outlines the progress made toward achieving its current strategic priorities:
Accelerating action on the Vancouver Principles
Increasing the operational effectiveness of the security sector
Integrating children’s and community perspectives in security sector responses to prevent the recruitment and use of children
As co-developers and custodians of the Vancouver Principles on Peacekeeping and the Prevention of the Recruitment and Use of Child Soldiers, the Dallaire Institute continues to work with partners to accelerate action and implementation. To date, 106 nations have endorsed the Vancouver Principles (VPs). The Institute’s regional Centres of Excellence in Rwanda and Uruguay, two of the founding endorsers of the VPs, combine high-level advocacy with field-focused and country-facing capabilities to ensure that Dallaire Institute programs are contextually relevant, culturally sensitive, and gender responsive.
More than 100,000 security personnel are deployed globally on peace support operations each year, most of whom are in conflict zones where children are recruited and used by armed forces and armed groups. This means that any meaningful steps to prevent this grave violation must also focus on the security sector. And as conflicts and peace support operations evolve, personnel are increasingly likely to encounter children in conflict contexts. The Dallaire Institute’s scenario-based, prevention-oriented training prepares military, police, and civilian personnel to prevent the recruitment and use of children in armed violence.
Dallaire Institute staff and partners train security forces in Mozambique in August 2022.
As the founder of the Dallaire Institute, LGen Roméo Dallaire knows all too well, encountering children recruited and used as soldiers can lead to serious moral injuries in security personnel if they are not equipped to deal with the mental health implications of being exposed to children in armed violence. Research on moral injury has been gaining international recognition and supports the Dallaire Institute’s unique approach of working directly with the security sector. The annual report highlights how this research can improve operational effectiveness as well as the health and wellbeing of military personnel and their families.
Effectively preventing the recruitment and use of children requires data on what makes children susceptible to this grave violation. To address this, the Dallaire Institute’s Knowledge for Prevention (K4P) Project has created the first early warning predictive model that helps to identify the combination of factors that increase or decrease the likelihood of children’s recruitment and use. Integrating child-centred indicators into this early warning system and working with communities and youth are just some of the ways the Dallaire Institute is developing new approaches to peace and security.
A meeting of the Dallaire Institute’s Women’s Network for Children, Peace and Security in South Sudan in March 2023.
With 22 trainings over the last year – including a total of 2,981 security sector actors, 238 of which were women – the Dallaire Institute is committed to working collaboratively to develop new solutions and transform the cycles of violence that affect children. Read the full report to learn more about the role that communities, youth, researchers, NGOs and state actors can play in building sustainable peace and security.
Read the full report here.
Peace is possible, violence is preventable, and children must be at the heart of the solutions.
