Preventing and Reducing Armed Violence

Armed violence reduction and prevention1 (AVR) is driven by the humanitarian and development imperative to accelerate global development by reducing the global burden of armed violence. The AVR approach responds to contemporary challenges of violence by addressing the risk factors for crime, interpersonal violence and conflict. Local and national governments experience armed violence most directly and have pioneered a range of preventive responses, often with the support of local communities. The donor community and UN system are also increasingly aware of the potential of targeted preventive measures. They have begun to adapt their strategies and instruments to better assist countries in their struggle to prevent and reduce all forms of
violence. This report provides an overview of some of the emerging lessons learned about how AVR priorities can be integrated into local, national and donor development plans and assistance strategies.
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Victims and Survivors of Armed Violence: Responding to Rights and Needs

This paper reviews key areas of policy and service provision relevant to the rights of victims and survivors of armed violence. It notes the broad humanitarian and development impact of armed violence in both conflict and non-conflict settings, and introduces a rights-based approach to victims and survivors of violence that has been developed over recent decades. It then summarizes key issues in areas of health, justice and social and economic inclusion and considers the implications for national level planning. It concludes with broad recommendations to strengthen international responses to the impact of armed violence. An international response to the problem of armed violence should have as its starting point “the people that are affected by armed violence – both the first-order victims and the wider communities and societies that also suffer consequences.” Data on the impact of armed violence are limited internationally, but recent research suggests that every year, conservatively at least 740,000 people are killed, directly or indirectly, by armed violence. Hundreds of thousands more are injured or suffer psychological trauma; and millions of others live in families and communities that bear the social and economic burden of this violence
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Humanitarian Action in the New Security Environment: Policy and Operational Implications in Somalia and Somaliland

The objective of this case study is to assess to what extent the humanitarian community in Somalia has faced an increase or decrease in insecurity during the last decade (1997 to 2006), and in either case: a) what were the reasons and circumstances; b) what were the policy responses; c) and what was the relationship between the real or perceived security environment and the applied security response systems/approaches. The report identifies changes in, and perceptions of, security and threat levels, and maps the individual security practices of key humanitarian actors and their collective security arrangements, in order to draw conclusions as to how the security environment has impacted on humanitarian delivery, including shifts towards localisation of response.
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A War Without Limits: Somalia's Humanitarian Catastrophe

For years, Somalia has been a byword for anarchic violence, famine, and drought. It is depicted as an inhospitable, ungovernable country ripped apart by long-standing internal feuds and, more recently, as a harbor for terrorism and piracy. Yet not only is this portrayal superficial, but paradoxically it has served to obscure both the nature and severity of the current crisis. The unmitigated disaster that Somalis have experienced in the past two years is not just another episode of the country's troubled history; it is the result of a particularly brutal and escalating war spawned by the clash of national, regional, and international political agendas.
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The African Union, the United Nations and Civilian Protection Challenges in Darfur

This paper1 examines the nature of the relationship between the African Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) in the field of protection of civilians in armed conflicts. The topic is significant because the development that has seen the UN and regional organisations take on and try to implement protection responsibilities means that the civilian protection regime is evolving in terms of its political purposes, main formal institutions and coordination mechanisms, as well as legal frameworks. The AU and the UN have come to operationalise the still contested notion of protection of civilians in armed conflicts through adding this as a dimension of peace operations. Yet, performing such a role is among the most contested and inherently difficult for the UN itself as well as for non-UN actors. In part, states are divided over this emerging norm because it raises difficult questions of sovereignty. It challenges the prevailing interpretations in international society of core norms such as non-intervention and domestic jurisdiction. Additionally, peace operations with civilian protection mandates tend to be short-term, have often entailed high levels of use of force and have had quite ambiguous humanitarian consequences, in combination with unclear lines of accountability between non-UN actors and the UN Security Council (UNSC). The paper proposes that we can best understand the AU-UN collaboration for civilian protection from a perspective that takes seriously the value of legitimacy for state actors. The benefits of such an approach are illustrated by reference to the AU’s lead role in the Darfur conflict and its African Mission in Sudan (AMIS). It concludes that since the AUUN relationship for civilian protection currently seems to be ‘the only game in town’, and since this state of affairs is becoming more institutionalised and legitimated, it is necessary that scholars critically comment on the political effects of this in terms of the quality of the actual protection provided. Fundamentally, the paper draws on a particular understanding of international legitimacy to increase our understanding of how the UNSC has executed its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security in relation to Africa.
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