IICI guidelines for investigating international crimes and serious human rights violations affecting children (ongoing)

As part of IICI's children-focused investigations capacity-building work, we hope to publish written guidelines for the investigation and documentation of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and grave human rights violations against and otherwise affecting children around the end of 2026.  A group of experts are reviewing a draft.

The audience of the guidelines will include international and national criminal and human rights investigators, documenters and monitors, as well as other professionals involved in such work.

Investigating such crimes and violations in resource-constrained environments (such as conflict-affected and failed-state contexts, refugee and IDP camps) in accordance with the best interests of children, other minimum standards and applicable international law and best practices will form a key component of the guidelines.  The guidelines will underscore that directly engaging with children for accountability purposes should be undertaken only by those with specific investigation skills and experience related to children and accountability.  The guidelines will plug an important gap and support the building of the international community’s capacity to properly investigate and pursue justice for such crimes and violations.  

The guidelines will build on IICI’s earlier children-focused training courses, including the pilot course which IICI co-organised with Justice Rapid Response. The guidelines will also inform IICI's future children-focused training and mentoring work.