Rehabilitation and social reintegration of asylum-seeking children affected by war and armed conflict

The report presents recommendations on how to improve identification, rehabilitation and social re/integration of war-affected asylum-seeking children.

Commissioned by the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI) and the Norwegian Directorate of Health, this study focuses on the realization of the right to rehabilitation and social reintegration assistance to asylum-seeking children who have been victims of, participated in or witnessed acts of war.

The report describes good practices on psychosocial support from Denmark, Sweden and Luxembourg and presents lessons learned from rehabilitation and reintegration programmes for war-affected children by international organizations (Save the Children, UNICEF, UNHCR and Red Cross).

The report argues that rehabilitation interventions and social re/integration measures need to take into account both protective factors and risk factors. Examples of protective factors are structured activities within arenas such as school and kindergarten, a well-established and stable accommodation, participation in regular recreational activities, supportive and emotionally available parents, supportive adults outside the family and peer relationships, not least through establishing new social networks with native peers. Appropriate cross-culturally sensitive therapeutic care need to be provided to those children, or those parents, who are traumatized or suffer from other types of mental problems related to war experiences.

The report presents recommendations to authorities on how to improve identification, rehabilitation and social re/integration of war-affected asylum-seeking children.

Publication Date:
Mon 09 Nov 2015
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