Ever since our 2024 online training webinar regarding Children Born of War in Ukraine, we have had requests from several actors who work in present conflict zones to arrange a webinar to cover the topic more broadly. Considering this interest, The Children Born of War Project and be.dialogue hosted a capacity-building training webinar last Friday, September 4th, 2026. The goal of the webinar was to share evidence-based research findings and lessons from practice on Children Born of War (CBOW), and to facilitate dialogue and knowledge exchange among researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and other actors engaged in CBOW-related work globally. The speakers included Prof. Dr. Ingvill Constanze Ødegaard (Managing Director and Chairwoman of the Children Born of War Project, Norway), Lina Stotz (doctoral researcher with the EuroWARCHILD project, Norway), and Dr. Norman Mukasa (co-founder of training and consultancy network be.dialogue and lecturer at CBS, Germany). Moderator was Andrea Cocciarelli (advisor, Children Born of War Project, Norway).
Prof. Dr. Ødegaard started the webinar summarizing the state of the art on the topic of CBOW. This included core insights from both research and advocacy on the issue thus far, as well as pointing to important factors that must be considered going forward in both. Next, Dr. Mukasa spoke of lessons learned from northern Uganda, speaking as a researcher and as someone who was in the field in the time after the LRA armed conflict. Stotz then covered the importance of recognition of CBOW, emphasizing both legal recognition and recognition within families and communities. Finally, the participants got to see a video created as part of the EuroWARCHILD project (University of Oslo/PRIO, Norway), where CBOW from several European countries share their experiences and thoughts on why continuing research and advocacy is important. A discussion with participants concluded the webinar.
We thank both the speakers and the participating organizations for their time and interest, and hope the webinar provided insights that will be helpful as the work to support Children Born of War continues.
