Protecting Tomorrow

In the fall of 2013, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) captured its first territory in Iraq. After four years of harrowing crimes, Iraq’s Prime Minister could declare military victory over ISIS in December 2017. Since the beginning of the fight against ISIS, international actors including the United Nations, international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), and several states have publicly committed to help Iraq defeat ISIS and deal with the fallout of the conflict. After the United States, Germany is the second-largest donor in Iraq: since 2014, Germany has invested a total of approximately three billion euros in humanitarian assistance, development aid, and stabilization. Even after ISIS’ territorial defeat, Germany remains committed to help Iraq rebuild and prevent a resurgence of ISIS, making Iraq a focus region of German investments. 

Five years after ISIS’ territorial defeat, the enduring repercussions of their reign of terror still affect the country – particularly in Iraq’s Northern regions, where ISIS held territory from 2013 to 2017. The militias who fought ISIS under the umbrella of Popular Mobilized Forces (or al-hashd alsha’abi; PMF), other armed groups like the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK), and pockets of ISIS are still active in the region. However, outbreaks of violent conflict have decreased and donors like Germany now evaluate the security situation in Iraq to be comparatively stable. As a consequence, donor attention is shifting towards other regions. Germany is currently phasing out its humanitarian assistance and crisis response measures – no new humanitarian projects are planned in Iraq as of 2024. Thus, Germany’s engagement in Iraq is at a crossroads – this is a crucial moment to shed light on the potential risks of this transition. In doing so, this analysis focuses on one particularly vulnerable and relevant demographic: children.

Around half of the population in the post-ISIS areas are children under the age of 18. They are especially vulnerable to persistent violence in the area, internal displacement and obstacles for returnees, poor economic conditions conducive to child labor, and educational inaccessibility, among other harms.The ongoing suffering of children in the post-ISIS areas constitutes not only a violation of children’s rights but can have far-reaching consequences for questions of social cohesion, economic development, and security. The ties between stabilization and peacebuilding and the safety of children are often overlooked or dismissed as a ​“soft” policy issue, including in the German foreign policy context.10 However, children have active roles in conflicts, as victims, perpetrators, and agents of change, ultimately influencing long-term developments of conflicts as they grow into adult members of society.

The goals of this project are twofold: Firstly, this study provides insights into the current protection outlook for children in Northern Iraq, their risk to be radicalized and recruited by armed groups, and implications for the future of the country. Secondly, it evaluates whether Germany’s contributions to child protection in the post-ISIS areas are effective and aligned with their stated policy goals in the region. The unique value of this project lies in its integration of assessments concerning child protection, foreign policy, and the donor spending that underpins both. Thus, this report offers a novel perspective on the influence that children, as a demographic, can exert on stabilization and peacebuilding efforts in conflict-affected countries. The analysis of this dynamic in Iraq may also serve as an impulse to reevaluate donors’ approaches to conflict management in other contexts.

The following chapter outlines this project’s mixed methods approach, involving interviews with a wide range of experts and a spending mapping of Germany’s investments in Iraq since the end of ISIS’ rule. Chapter 3 introduces important foundations on child protection, peace and security, and intergenerational dynamics of violence that are crucial to understand the following arguments. Chapter 4 draws on expert interviews and available literature to provide an overview of the current situation in Northern Iraq, covering updates on the conflict, socioeconomic issues, and key child protection concerns. Chapter 5 analyzes Germany’s role as a donor in Iraq, including a mapping of its spending in the country since ISIS’ military defeat in late 2017. Finally, chapter 6 synthesizes arguments on child protection concerns, security, and Germany’s spending in Iraq and presents policy recommendations for German policymakers.

Sofie Stoffel’s report originally came out as a Save the Children report, published in July 2024. This section has footnotes; find them in the report’s Introduction.