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Australian Defence Force personnel have delivered a Gender in Military Operations workshop to Royal Cambodian Armed Forces personnel during Indo-Pacific Endeavour 24.
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The two-day workshop was delivered to predominately military police students in Kampong Speu, Cambodia, to prepare them for their upcoming United Nations peacekeeping mission in South Sudan.
Commandant of Australian War College Air Commodore Ruth Elsley visited the students conducting the workshop.
As Australia’s first female commander of an overseas contingent and a gender adviser, she was able to engage with students from a unique perspective given her own gender in military operations experience.
She also congratulated Cambodia on its achievements to reach 20.8 per cent female peacekeepers – already above the UN’s 2025 target of 15 per cent female troops in peace operations.
Lead instructor Captain Harrison Pastega said the workshop focused on the basics of gender and how to apply this in operational planning.
“We started by conducting a targeted gender analysis of the UN mission in South Sudan, reviewed the reports of conflict-related violence and exploitation there, and analysed the different health and education standards for both genders and children,” CAPT Pastega said.
“Going through this important analysis of the area, we could then educate the students [on] how to apply this to their engagements with the community and key leaders.
“Overall, the goal is to ensure they have the tools necessary before they deploy, to have a force that is approachable to all genders and children.
“They now will be better equipped to understand what the community in South Sudan needs and then be able to feed that back to the UN to provide relief and aid where necessary.
“The students were very engaged; they shared their own ideas of how they’ll apply the principles we’ve given them.
“It has been really rewarding to see them pick up the content so quickly.”
Major Hieng Narin of the Royal Cambodian Army participated in the workshop and said it would help him and his team prepare for their upcoming deployment.
“This workshop will be very useful for us when we deploy,” Major Hieng said.
“This meets the requirements we need to prepare us for our UN peacekeeping missions.
“The instructors delivered the content very well; it was easy for all of us to follow, even with English being our second language.
“We’ll keep this knowledge and add it to our pre-deployment training.”
