Newsletters 2008, no 3-1 Newsletters 2009, no 5-1
Newsletters 2010, no 5-1 Newsletters 2011, no 5-1 Boletín 2012, no 5-1
NEWSLETTER NO.1 MAY 16TH 2012
Dear friends and colleagues.
According to UNICEF 10 million children have been traumatized by war or conflict over the last decade. There are at least two relevant issues here. First of all the nature of conflict is changing. The traditional understanding of what constitutes a non-state armed group in a non-international armed conflict as provided by International Humanitarian Law is challenged. Furthermore non-international armed conflicts differ enormously, from those which resemble regular warfare as part of international armed conflicts, to others that are basically unstructured. In this situation it is very difficult to raise awareness and respect for humanitarian law in any systematic way. And given the situation where the most vulnerable, namely the children seem to be targeted in the conflict, the resolution 1612 adopted by the Security Council in 2005 is particularly important. The resolution requested the Secretary-General to implement a monitoring and reporting mechanism on children and armed conflict. It also required the establishment of a working group to review the reports on the work of such mechanisms. The mechanism established through the resolution monitors in particular six severe violations: (a) killing or maiming of children; (b) recruiting or using child soldiers; (c) attacks against schools or hospitals; (d) rape and other grave sexual violence against children; (e) abduction of children; and (f) denial of humanitarian access for children. The working group made recommendations to the Security Council on possible measures to promote the protection of children affected by armed conflict and addresses requests to other United Nations bodies for action to support the implementation of the Security Council resolution and by institutionalize practical measures towards the ending of impunity of violating parties.
As there seems to be a stronger awareness on these issues as part of these international initiatives, we see the results in the attempts to end impunity for crimes against children. On 14 March 2012 the a Trial Chamber 1 of the International Criminal Court (ICC) found Thomas Lubanga Dylo guilty of the war crime of enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 years and forcing them to participate actively in hostilities during the armed conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The other relevant issue here is related to what happens when the conflict or war period is over, and the country is entering into the transitional period. The children that have been in the middle of the conflict have
had little or no rights and may be severely affected by what they have been part of and experienced. According to the International Bureau for Children’s Rights
“The term ‘transitional justice’ refers to “the full range of processes and mechanisms associated with a society’s attempts to come to terms with a legacy of large-scale past abuses, in order to ensure accountability,
serve justice and achieve reconciliation. The Bureau further argues very importantly that, ”Historically, transitional justice processes have neglected the specific needs and rights of children and have not promoted their
involvement in peace processes. Recently, perceptions about the role of children in post-conflict societies have begun to change. This is due to the increased involvement of children in armed conflicts in a variety of roles.
In addition to being victims of conflicts, children are now forcibly recruited as combatants and helpers to armed groups. The increasing involvement of children in active combat, sometimes for decades, and the recruitment of
children as young as eight years old (as was seen in Sierra Leone), have resulted in new levels of human rights violations of children.” International Bureau for Children’s Rights
claim that to ensure a long term peace,
security and development of a country, children must be included in the peace process.
The Security Council resolution 1379 emphasized the importance of addressing the serious abuses
involving children in post-conflict truth and reconciliation processes. These processes are important not only to document abuses, but also provide an opportunity for children to tell their stories and participate
in peace building and reconciliation also as part of the way in which they can deal with their experiences.
The UNICEF INNOCENTI Research Centre has developed a the Working Paper Series
intended to generate dialogue and consensus, and to better inform about children´s protection and participation in ongoing or planned transitional justice processes in the
countries moving out of conflict. As children are recruited or used in armed conflict they are also treated as adults when it comes to torture, cruel, inhumane or degrading
treatment and punishment. Papers in this series also address the medical and psychological aspect of torture on children and the long-lasting and devastating effect torture may have
in children who have fewer possibilities to protect and defend themselves than adult combatants. States have an inescapable responsibility not only to prevent torture and punish those
responsible for torture but also to assist the victims both with regard to immediate care and reintegration into society, and with regard to reparation as part of redress to those subjected
to torture and ill-treatment. These duties have special implications for health professionals. And in the work to develop this field, and remind those responsible of their obligation to provide
rehabilitation in the wide sense of the word, we must be particularly aware of the situation for children and their special needs. This represents a great challenge for health professionals, who
should be aware not only on the human rights principles involved in the right to reparation for children, but also be able to assist professionally in this often complex and challenging endeavor.
The right to reparation after torture refers to children as well as to adults and this includes the right to means for as full rehabilitation as possible. The work developed by the
Committee against Torture on a General comment to article 14 on the right to redress after torture,
may be an important tool in the work to strengthen the care and rehabilitation that should be provided to young victims of torture. The information listed below represents valuable resources and professional input in relation to this important work.
Recommendations
The impact of child detention in occupied Palestinian territory. Save the children Sweden
This report aims at giving an insight into the treatment of children in armed conflict, with a primary focus on children in detention. It also provides an overview on psychosocial responses, as developed by Save the Children and the EJ-YMCA, whereas the last part discusses the role of community in the re-integration process of children and presents a list of recommendations when dealing with this subject.
Resilience & Recovery after WAR: Refugee children and families in the United States. APA 2010
reviews the research on the psychosocial effects of war on children and families, identifies areas of needed culturally and developmentally appropriate research, and provides recommendations for culturally and developmentally informed practice and programs.
Study of community-based child protection mechanisms in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo By mapping existing community-based protection initiatives, structures and approaches, the study intended to identify effective and sustainable community-based mechanisms and offer recommendations in order to help support the development of its community-based child protection strategy in Uganda and in the DRC.
Posttraumatic Resilience in Former Ugandan Child Soldiers Klasen et al. 2010 – Child development
The present research examines posttraumatic resilience in extremely exposed children and adolescents based on interviews with 330 former Ugandan child soldiers (age = 11–17, female = 48.5%). Despite severe trauma exposure, 27.6% showed posttraumatic resilience as indicated by the absence of posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, and clinically significant behavioral and emotional problems. Among these former child soldiers, posttraumatic resilience was associated with lower exposure to domestic violence, lower guilt cognitions, less motivation to seek revenge, better socioeconomic situation in the family, and more perceived spiritual support. Among the youth with significant psychopathology, many of them had symptoms extending beyond the criteria for posttraumatic stress disorder, in keeping with the emerging concept of developmental trauma disorder. Implications for future research, intervention, and policy are discussed.
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Thematic page on torture with Russian links.
We are still working to develop our page looking at different aspects of torture , with links to documents in Russian language. We would have preferred that the whole page was in Russian but our server does not support Russian letters. For those of you that read Russian please have a look. We appreciate feedback on what you think and ideas for further development. So – if there are any other links that you think would be useful for Russian reading colleagues, please let us know. We would also like to add that the book on Political Psychology (Pax) by Nora Sveaass and Nils Johan Lavik has now been translated into into Russian and will be published very soon.
Our thematic pages in Spanish
Do not forget our Spanish thematic pages and please invite Spanish speaking readers to take a closer look at the different thematic pages. It would especially be good if you could give us comments or suggestions regarding our pages in Spanish, it would also be very good if you could send us links on organizations that work in the Spanish speaking areas.
Upcoming events
Mental Health Europe
"From individual to collective responsibility The social determinants of mental health"
14-16 June, 2012 Split, Croatia.
Summer School on Psychosocial Interventions in Emergency Displacement
Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna and the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
18th - 30th June 2012.
Pisa, Italy
Health Sector Reform: Applying Human Rights Based Approaches
16th - 20th July 2012.
National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland
ISTSS 28th Annual Meeting
"Beyond Boundaries: Innovations to Expand Services and
Tailor Traumatic Stress Treatments"
1 st - 3 rd November, 2012.
31st October - Pre-Meeting Institutes -
JW Marriott Los Angeles, California USA
The 3rd International Conference on Survivors of Rape
"Survivors at the Heart 2012"
8th - 10th November, 2012.
National University of Ireland,
Galway, Republic of Ireland
2. International psychological trauma meeting VII
"Social Trauma; The Results and Coping"
Nov 30th - Dec 2nd 2012
Istanbul Bilgi University, Istanbul, Turkey
The ESTSS Conference
"Trauma and its clinical pathways PTSD and beyond"
6th - 9th th June 2013,
Bologna, Italy (Info at the end of Miranda Olff’s opening address).
We appreciate feedback and comments
As always we are delighted to receive comments and suggestions for the HHRI web page. In order to improve our assistance to those working with psychosocial support with persons in situations of conflict, emergency and subjected to human rights violations, we need information from you. We are also interested in spreading news about events and conferences held in Asia, Latin America and Africa.
Health and Human Rights Info writes and distributes this newsletter, currently reaching more than 4.700 subscribers, free of charge. If you receive this newsletter for the first time, it is either because someone has recommended that we add your e-mail address to the list of subscribers, or because we believe that you might be interested in some or all of its content. Consider it an offer. If you want to continue to receive this newsletter, you don't need to do anything. If you do not wish to receive this newsletter, please send us an e-mail and we will delete you from our mailing list.
If you know anyone who would be interested in receiving this e-newsletter about our project, please forward it, and encourage them to sign up by sending us an
e-mail.
Sincerely yours
Health and Human Rights Info
Elisabeth Ng Langdal
Project coordinator
postmaster@hhri.org
www.hhri.org
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NEWSLETTER NO.5 December 23rd 2011
Dear friends and colleagues.
This time of the year one tends to fall into contemplation. Some of our colleagues may have endured difficult working situations during
the year, many by having been exposed to the suffering and losses of others, and some also by being directly exposed to threats and
violence while working to alleviate and prevent. Trauma and disaster have effects on the helper. How do we manage stressful situations
in order to complete our good work? For all helpers, in particular mental health workers, empathy is an essential aspect of good help.
But this is also a source for compassion fatigue, vicarious traumatisation or secondary traumatic stress (STS).
All of these are terms often used to describe the fact that helpers are involved, react and may be seriously affected by what
happens around them. Early recognition and awareness are crucial in order to be resilient in such situations and to symptoms
resulting from this. We also know that professionals under this kind of stresses such as in conflict areas and during emergencies
may be at risk to perform less efficiently than they normally would do. Even large organizations that have the resources and
knowledge about these particular kinds of stresses may have reduced capacity to deal with or take care of their personnel in term of
limited awareness of the dangers and symptoms, limited capacity for early intervention and prevention, limited action for assistance and perhaps few follow-up procedures. This may often be the case for international professionals, but even more so for local helpers, where there often seems to be very little support or resources to deal with this. It will be useful for all of us working out in the field or work closely with traumatised people to take some time to recharge out engines and get ready for another year.
Recommendations
We can recommend some useful web sites and organisations that shares information on how workers in the field can deal with stressful situations. The Headington Institute provides some other very good online training courses. On their site you will find training courses that are helpful:
“Understanding and coping with traumatic stress”
“Trauma and critical incident care for
humanitarian workers”
“On the road again”
“Understanding and addressing vicarious trauma”
“Stress and stress management for national staff”
“Supporting national staff”
“Family matters”
“Running stress
management workshop with cross-cultural groups”
And the organization The Mindfullness for NGO
gives you a more personal insight into the world of NGO workers in stressful situation. They are bringing mindfulness-based stress reduction and burnout prevention training to aid workers and professionals on the frontline that work in partnership with Oxford University.
Thematic page on torture with Russian links.
We are still working to develop our page looking at different aspects of torture , with links to documents in Russian language. The page on gender based violence, is still under construction, also with links to Russian documents. We would have preferred that the whole page was in Russian but our server does not support Russian letters. For those of you that read Russian please have a look. We appreciate feedback on what you think and ideas for further development. So – if there are any other links that you think would be useful for Russian reading colleagues, please let us know.
Our thematic pages in Spanish
Do not forget our Spanish thematic pages and do invite Spanish speaking readers to take a closer look at the different thematic pages. It would especially be good if you could give us comments or suggestions regarding our pages in Spanish, it would also be very good if you could send us links on organizations that work in the Spanish speaking areas.
Upcoming events
Mental Health Europe
"From individual to collective responsibility The social determinants of mental health"
14-16 June, 2012 Split, Croatia.
ISTSS 28th Annual Meeting
"Beyond Boundaries: Innovations to Expand Services and
Tailor Traumatic Stress Treatments"
1 st - 3 rd November, 2012.
31st October - Pre-Meeting Institutes -
JW Marriott Los Angeles, California USA
The ESTSS Conference
"Trauma and its clinical pathways PTSD and beyond"
6-9 th June 2013, Bologna, Italy (Info at the end of Miranda Olff’s opening address).
We appreciate feedback and comments
As always we are delighted to receive comments and suggestions for the HHRI web page. In order to improve our assistance to those working with psychosocial support with persons in situations of conflict, emergency and subjected to human rights violations, we need information from you. We are also interested in spreading news about events and conferences held in Asia, Latin America and Africa.
Health and Human Rights Info writes and distributes this newsletter, currently reaching more than 4.600 subscribers, free of charge. If you receive this newsletter for the first time, it is either because someone has recommended that we add your e-mail address to the list of subscribers, or because we believe that you might be interested in some or all of its content. Consider it an offer. If you want to continue to receive this newsletter, you don't need to do anything. If you do not wish to receive this newsletter, please send us an e-mail and we will delete you from our mailing list.
If you know anyone who would be interested in receiving this e-newsletter about our project, please forward it, and encourage them to sign up by sending us an
e-mail.
HHRI wish you a peaceful 2012 with better conditions for justice and human rights for all.
Sincerely yours
Health and Human Rights Info
Elisabeth Ng Langdal
Project coordinator
postmaster@hhri.org
www.hhri.org
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NEWSLETTER NO.4 December 6th 2011
Dear friends and colleagues.
Globally, mental health has been under-prioritised in most countries – even in developed and high-income economies.
For developing and lower income economies, the situation is unison; scarce economic resources are directed towards other health issues.
Looking at the World Health Organization’s Global Burden of Disease (GBD), however, it is clear that mental illness represents a heavy
burden for society. The stigma still associated with mental illness also prevents it from being put on the agenda,”
says
Edward Hauff in “Healing of a nation”.
In many countries there is a great need for more knowledge on how to deal with mental health issues in general and in particular how to deal with traumas that are effects of war and conflicts. By focusing on how to build capacity within our field and to prioritise the need for training and development of skills, we may increase our ability to deal with issues concerning mental health. Capacity building rests on many conditions, including prepared personnel, institutional and infrastructural capacity and motivation, and networks and partnerships. “Internet” may be one way of bringing together health specialists, human rights advocates, social workers and other professionals working to eliminate gross human rights violations and assist affected people in different parts of the world. This opportunity to share knowledge and experience about how to combat the effects of torture and human rights abuses on mental health is one that we must be taken into active use, in order to gain new skills and strengthen capacity.
Hopefully, the torture survivors and survivors of other gross human rights' violations may benefit from services of colleagues that work and are trained in ways of working with rehabilitation and in community work with the aim of creating healthier communities following conflicts. The exchange of information with colleagues from all around the world working under different circumstances will always represent an important contribution in addition to existing literature, and as part of capacity building. By creating arenas for such capacity building we also bridge the knowledge between the “north” and the “south” and make it easier to connect without the issues concerning economic differences.
Today there are several useful internet pages where we can share and develop our skills:
Mental Health & Psychosocial Network (MHPSS) is a global platform for connecting people, networks and organisations, for sharing resources and for building knowledge related to mental health and psychosocial support both in emergency settings and in situations of adversity. They aspire to build and shape good practice in support of people affected by difficult events or circumstances. For our Spanish speaking colleagues we would like to introduce to you the Community Action Group (CAG) and their psicosocial.net. They aspire to be a space, and a support network for people, groups, institutions and organizations working in the psychosocial and community level, especially in issues related to mental health work and human rights, with particular emphasis on the Latino community. CAG believe that building network also creates mechanisms that strengthen the capacity of resistance, self-management and mobilization of people and communities affected by political violence or disasters. It also helps to promote shared knowledge management systems horizontal teaching and learning, based on the idea of sharing knowledge.
"Doing Justice, Building Capacity"
The 9th ISHHR conference that was held in Tbilisi Georgia was a great success. We would like to thank the organizers for a creating a wonderful meeting place for mental health workers, activists, fieldworkers, clinical professional and human rights defenders. We also would like to thank all the participants sharing their time and knowledge. We hope to meet all of you again in Zimbabwe in 2014. The conference report will be available from February 2012.
Thematic page on torture with Russian links.
As a contribution to capacity-building for our colleagues in the Eastern region
we have developed a page dealing with different aspects of
torture, with links to documents in Russian language. We are also working on a page
on gender based violence, also with links to
Russian documents. We would have preferred that the whole page was in Russian but our server does not support Russian letters. For those of you that read Russian please have a look. We appreciate feedback on what you think and ideas for further development. So – if there are any other links that you think would be useful for Russian reading colleagues, please let us know.
Our thematic pages in Spanish
Thank you for useful comments on our Spanish thematic pages. We continuously revise and upgrade our Spanish thematic pages and invite you to give us comments or suggestions regarding our pages in Spanish, it would also be very good if you could send us links on organizations that work in the Spanish speaking areas. If you know of conferences in the Latino community that would be of common interest we are more than happy to post it under “Upcoming events”.
Upcoming events
Please take a look at the call for applications for the inaugural Managing Gender-based Violence Programmes in Emergencies training workshop. This 7-day training course is offered by UNFPA and International Medical Corps and aims to build both technical knowledge of gender-based violence and practical skills in program design and management. This course builds on the Managing Gender-based Violence Programmes in Emergencies e-learning course that was launched in April 2011 by UNFPA.
The course will be held Feb. 15-22, 2012 in Nairobi, Kenya. It is a residential course, and all participants will be expected to stay at the training site. Expenses for this inaugural workshop will be covered for all applicants.
The deadline for all applications is Dec. 20, 2011. Late applications will not be considered. Application instructions are included in the attached document.
Any questions regarding this course should be sent to, Angela Wiens; Senior Associate, Gender and Flagship Initiatives, International Medical Corps, or Erin Kenny, Gender-based Violence Specialist, Humanitarian Response Branch, UNFPA.
Mental Health Europe
"From individual to collective responsibility The social determinants of mental health"
14-16 June, 2012 Split, Croatia.
ISTSS 28th Annual Meeting
"Beyond Boundaries: Innovations to Expand Services and
Tailor Traumatic Stress Treatments"
1 st - 3 rd November, 2012.
31st October - Pre-Meeting Institutes -
JW Marriott Los Angeles, California USA
The ESTSS Conference
"Trauma and its clinical pathways PTSD and beyond"
6-9 th June 2013, Bologna, Italy (Info at the end of Miranda Olff’s opening address).
We appreciate feedback and comments
As always we are delighted to receive comments and suggestions for the HHRI web page. In order to improve our assistance to those working with psychosocial support with persons in situations of conflict, emergency and subjected to human rights violations, we need information from you. We are also interested in spreading news about events and conferences held in Asia, Latin America and Africa.
Health and Human Rights Info writes and distributes this newsletter, currently reaching more than 4.100 subscribers, free of charge. If you receive this newsletter for the first time, it is either because someone has recommended that we add your e-mail address to the list of subscribers, or because we believe that you might be interested in some or all of its content. Consider it an offer. If you want to continue to receive this newsletter, you don't need to do anything. If you do not wish to receive this newsletter, please send us an e-mail and we will delete you from our mailing list.
If you know anyone who would be interested in receiving this e-newsletter about our project, please forward it, and encourage them to sign up by sending us an
e-mail.
Sincerely yours
Health and Human Rights Info
Elisabeth Ng Langdal
Project coordinator
postmaster@hhri.org
www.hhri.org
To the top
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The comments and evaluation on this page are made by our staff to make
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