At the concluding plenary session of the 28th Meeting of Mine Action National Directors and United Nations Advisers (NDM-UN28), held in Geneva from 9 to 11 April 2025, mine action and protection experts from across the humanitarian sector convened to reaffirm the centrality of casualty recording to effective and accountable mine action.
Chaired by Mr. Khalifa Lawan, National Mine Action Coordinator of Nigeria, the session titled “Casualty Recording: A Fundamental Tool to Preserve Lives” brought together practitioners and policymakers to examine how accurate, disaggregated data on explosive ordnance casualties underpins victim assistance, demining, risk education, advocacy, and human rights protection.
Opening the session, Mr. Lawan set out the session’s twofold objective: to demonstrate how casualty recording can be used to make mine action more evidence-based, effective, and lifesaving, and to show how such data informs and advances the protection of human rights. The chair highlighted that without rigorous casualty reporting, efforts in mine clearance, risk education, and rehabilitation remain under-informed and potentially misdirected.
Mr. Meera Muhiadeen Nayeemudeen, National Mine Action Director of Sri Lanka, opened the presentations with a detailed account of how his country’s national information system for mine action (IMSMA) has recorded over 3,700 victims. He said that Sri Lanka has embedded casualty recording into national health and social service systems, enabling free, decentralised access to medical care, prosthetics, and psychosocial support for survivors. This evidence, Nayeemudeen said, has guided policy changes, including a new Disability Rights Act approved by the Cabinet in February 2025, and informed referral systems that prioritise victims in the most affected northern and eastern provinces.
“Casualty recording is not just about numbers,” said Mr. Nayeemudeen. “It is a deeply human process—an expression of love for those affected and a tool to ensure they are not forgotten.”
Ms. Francesca Marotta, Chief of Methodology, Learning, Policy and Practice at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), explained how casualty data gathered through rigorous and transparent methodologies helps monitor compliance with international law and informs UN Security Council reporting. From Afghanistan to Ukraine, Marotta emphasised that systematic casualty recording provides a foundation for accountability and reparation. Between 2015 and 2024, OHCHR recorded nearly 357,000 conflict-related deaths in 16 situations of armed conflict, with more than 6% caused by planted explosives and unexploded ordnance. She called for greater collaboration with mine action partners and for more states to invest in national casualty tracking systems.
Mr. Ron Pouwels, Global Coordinator for the Child Protection Area of Responsibility at UNICEF, addressed the role of casualty recording within the UN’s Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism (MRM) on grave violations against children. He explained that explosive weapons, including landmines and improvised explosive devices, are now the leading cause of verified child casualties in conflict. In 2023, over 58% of children recorded as killed or maimed under the MRM were victims of explosive weapons, the majority in populated areas. The data, Pouwels said, are not just for reporting—they are tools for advocacy, operational planning, and policy reform. He urged mine action actors to connect their casualty data with MRM systems, making interventions more targeted and accountable.
Ms. Lisa Anouk Müller-Dormann of the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) described how her organisation uses casualty data to prioritise clearance and risk education in countries such as Yemen, Afghanistan, and South Sudan. She highlighted the importance of multisectoral programming and community-based partnerships, noting that casualty data must be integrated with information on displacement, vulnerability, and access to services. In Afghanistan, DRC’s mobile response teams provide rapid assistance based on casualty data, while in the occupied Palestinian territory, local partners are trained to fill out victim assistance forms to improve case management. Müller-Dormann also underscored the need for consistent methodologies and conflict-sensitive approaches to avoid retraumatising communities during data collection.
Mr. Rory Collins, Global Information Management and Analytics Advisor at UNOPS, presented a data visualisation tool developed to support mine action planning in contexts with limited in-country reporting capacity, such as Myanmar. Using open-source information, satellite imagery, AI decision trees, and geospatial overlays, the system identifies explosive threat patterns and overlays them with population movement, infrastructure, and health service locations. The tool, developed with input from institutions such as MIT and Carnegie Mellon, offers scalable solutions to support evidence-based prioritisation in areas where on-the-ground data is scarce. Collins stressed the need for donor support to fund information management roles and encouraged collaborative approaches through innovation hubs.
Contributions from the floor included testimony from the Syrian Network for Human Rights, which reported over 3,500 civilian deaths from landmines since 2011—nearly a third of them children—and warned of renewed risks as displaced Syrians return home. Speakers from Afghanistan urged donors to address the acute funding gap facing experienced local deminers. MAG and Humanity & Inclusion also emphasised that casualty data has historically shifted government priorities and called for stronger adherence to existing obligations, such as IMAS 13.10 on victim assistance data collection.
In concluding remarks, Chair Khalifa Lawan summarised five key takeaways: casualty recording makes mine action more evidence-based and lifesaving; it is vital for human rights protection; it must lead to tangible action; it contributes directly to SDG 16 on peace, justice, and strong institutions; and it requires specialised, systematic investment. The session closed with a collective call to expand partnerships, local capacity, and data systems that place victims and their communities at the centre of mine action programming.
As this final plenary demonstrated, casualty recording is not just a technical task—it is a political, humanitarian, and ethical imperative. For Action on Armed Violence, this work lies at the heart of our mission: to ensure that no civilian casualty goes unrecorded, no victim is overlooked, and no death is dismissed as collateral. Data, done right, is not just a record of harm. It is the beginning of justice.
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