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Post-war reconciliation can open wounds, deepen trauma - researchers

by Magdalena Mis | @magdalenamis1 | Thomson Reuters Foundation
Thursday, 12 May 2016 18:00 GMT

A man who had his left hand amputated sits at a camp for Amputees and War Wounded on the outskirts of Freetown in this file photo. REUTERS

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"Talking about war atrocities can prove psychologically traumatic for people affected by war"

LONDON, May 12 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Reconciliation programmes to bring together communities divided by conflict can re-open old wounds and deepen problems such as depression and trauma by reviving war memories, researchers said on Thursday.

In the first study of its kind, the researchers analysed the outcome of a reconciliation programme in Sierra Leone between 2011 and 2012, a decade after the country ended its civil war, in which more than 50,000 people were killed and many tens of thousands more were mutilated or raped by fighters.

The programme, carried out across 100 villages, brought together victims who described violence they experienced and perpetrators who admitted to crimes and asked for forgiveness.

While forgiveness towards perpetrators increased, the prevalence of severe trauma among the participants was more than a third higher than among those who didn't take part in the project, said the study, published in the journal Science.

"Talking about war atrocities can prove psychologically traumatic for people affected by war," Oeindrila Dube, assistant professor of politics and economics at New York University and one of the authors of the study, said in a statement.

"Invoking war memories appears to re-open old war wounds. At the same time, the reconciliation program we examined was also shown to improve social relations in communities divided by the war."

The study recorded mental health, social ties and attitudes towards former combatants of nearly 2,400 people, both among those who participated in the programme and those who did not.

Among the benefits of the programme the study noted increased forgiveness towards perpetrators, better relationships between community members and increased participation in community groups and religious organisations.

The researchers from Georgetown University, New York University, World Bank and the non-profit Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) said reconciliation programmes should be redesigned to reduce their negative impact.

"Policymakers may need to restructure reconciliation processes in ways that reduce their negative psychological costs, while retaining their positive societal benefits," Annie Duflo, IPA executive director, said in a statement. (Reporting by Magdalena Mis; Editing by Ros Russell; Please credit Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)

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