This presentation was given during an advocacy trip to New York to engage UN agencies, states' representatives, and NGOs on casualty recording in the context of the protection of civilians in armed conflict.
It focuses on the concrete benefits of recording casualties, the relevance of casualty recording to the 'Protection of Civilians (POC)' in Armed Conflict mandate, and addresses the challenges to this agenda.
These challenges include:
- enhancing compliance of participants in hostilities
- evaluating the effectiveness of operations
- ensuring accountability for violations of International Humanitarian Law
Drawing on ORG's research into casualty recording practice, the presentation demonstrates that there is a range of methods in recording, that different types of recording are possible under different circumstances, and that each offers different levels of verification and benefits.
Casualty recording has since been included in the May 2012 Secretary-General Report on the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict.
The video below is a modified version of a presentation first given to a workshop on 'Emerging Trends in the Protection of Civilians' hosted by the Group of Friends on Protection of Civlians in New York in May 2012. The presentation was given as part of a panel on Casualty Recording organised by ORG. The other presentation on the panel was given by the LRA Crisis Tracker, who are a member organisation of our International Practitioner Network.
The presentation is given by Elizabeth Minor, Research Officer at Oxford Research Group on the Every Casualty programme.
Recording Casualties and the Protection of Civilians from Oxford Research Group (ORG) on Vimeo.