£5 million to research ways to prevent and reduce civilian suffering in armed conflicts

A new consortium of academics and practitioners led by the University of York has been awarded up to £5 million (ca. 5,87 million euros) by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office to research ways to prevent and reduce civilian suffering in armed conflicts around the world. Katharine Fortin (Utrecht University) is one of the Co-Investigators.

Katharine Fortin, Utrecht University, said: There is still much to be learnt on how international humanitarian law and other legal regimes applicable in armed conflict capture the lived experiences of civilians in armed conflict, and the potential of different actors, including civilian communities to contribute to a compliance ecosystem which is defined not only by restraint but also protection.

The Beyond Compliance Consortium is a co-productive partnership between:

• The University of York (Ioana Cismas, Principal Investigator)
• The University of Glasgow (Rebecca Sutton, Co-Investigator)
• Utrecht University (Katharine Fortin, Co-Investigator)

And six humanitarian NGOs:

• Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict (Ezequiel Heffes, Co-Investigator),
• War Child UK
• Diakonia International Humanitarian Law Centre,
• Center for Civilians in Conflict,
• Centre on Armed Groups and
• Fight for Humanity.