Organizers

The Dealing with the Past Course is organized by the Human Security Division of the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) in collaboration with swisspeace.

Human Security Division, Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs

The Human Security Division: Peace, Human Rights, Humanitarian Policy, and Migration is responsible for implementing measures to promote peace and strengthen human rights in the world. The Division is divided into six sections:

The Section for Peace Policy is involved in activities to prevent and resolve armed conflicts, it focuses its activities on South Eastern Europe, Colombia, the Great Lakes Region, West Africa, Sri Lanka and Nepal, and its areas of special expertise are: mediation, facilitation and constitutionalism, elections, dealing with the past and genocide prevention, as well as religion, politics and conflict.
The Section for Multilateral Peace Policy is responsible for the Division’s activities in the areas of conflict prevention and peace promotion within international organisations, in particular the United Nations. Its areas of specialisation include the fight against illicit small arms and antipersonnel mines, countering the adverse effects of armed conflict on development, the reform of the security sector, as well as disarming and demobilising former combatants and their subsequent reintegration into civilian society.
The Section for Human Rights Policy works in both bilateral and multilateral forums to promote respect for human rights.
The Section for Humanitarian Policy and Migration is active in improving protection for civil populations in armed conflicts, for developing a policy on refugees and migration based on respect for human dignity, and for the effective combating of trafficking in human beings.
The Swiss Expert Pool for Civilian Peace Building (SEP) organises the rapid, flexible deployment of well-trained experts on a part-time basis for bilateral and multilateral projects.
The Finance and Administration section is responsible for the administration and control of the departmental credit of approximately CHF 60 million a year as well as for administrative project development and logistic coordination within the department.

In addition, Political Affairs Division IV includes:

The Office of the Special Envoy for the Sudan and the Horn of Africa that is principally concerned with the peace process in Sudan;
The Office of the Special Representative for the Middle East that coordinates all Switzerland’s peace promotion activities in this region;
The Special Envoy for Human Rights Issues, who is primarily responsible for Switzerland’s human rights dialogues with Vietnam, Cuba and countries in Central Asia;
The Office of the Ambassador-at-Large for the Geneva Conventions, whose main task is to conduct the necessary consultations in view of the holding of a conference of High Contracting Parties to the 4th Geneva Convention of 1949 in response to a recommendation by the United Nations General Assembly.

swisspeace

swisspeace is a practice-oriented peace research institute. It carries out research on violent conflicts and their peaceful transformation. The Foundation aims to build up Swiss and international organizations' civilian peacebuilding capacities by providing trainings, space for networking and exchange of experiences. It also shapes political and academic discourses on peace policy issues at the national and international level through publications, workshops and conferences. swisspeace therefore promotes knowledge transfer between researchers and practitioners.

swisspeace was founded in 1988 as the Swiss Peace Foundation in order to promote independent peace research in Switzerland. Today the Foundation employs more than 40 staff members. Its most important donors are the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, the Swiss National Science Foundation and the United Nations. swisspeace is an associate institute of the University of Basel..

For more information on the organizers see also Core Team.