Sexual violence in conflict, and sexual exploitation and abuse by international peacekeepers

The purpose of this joint review is twofold. First, we will explore how well the UK government has delivered on the promise of the PSVI initiative and what progress has been made towards its commitments to reduce stigma for survivors, increase justice and accountability, and increase preventative efforts since the 2014 Global Summit.

Second, this review also offers the opportunity to assess in parallel the ways in which the UK government has been active in addressing the challenge of violations committed by international peacekeepers, police and civilian staff.

The joint review will therefore limit its focus on sexual violence to particular sets of circumstances and characteristics. These are:

• Context: violations take place in a conflict zone.
• Perpetrators: in Part 1 (our review of the PSVI), violations are perpetrated by military forces, police, non-state armed combatants, or civilian staff of any of the aforementioned. In Part 2 (our review of SEA), violations are perpetrated by international peacekeeping soldiers and civilian staff linked to peacekeeping operations.
• Goal: the motivations for the violations range from (i) opportunity-led, facilitated by the lawlessness and impunity prevalent in conflict zones, (ii) targeted at a community/person as a weapon of war, often with a political goal, or (iii) used as a unifying mechanism to connect units which are engaged in the pursuit of a common goal (political or otherwise).
• Survivors: violations are targeted at female, male or otherwise gendered survivors, and include children.

The review will assess the relevance and effectiveness of the UK government’s response following the 2014 Global Summit. This includes reviewing the extent to which the response is evidence-based and whether lessons have been captured to inform future programming. The review will also examine how well DFID, the FCO and the MOD have collaborated across and within institutions, and the degree to which programming took into account the voices of survivors.